


The Masks We Wear

by vixenviews (alteringviews)



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alpha Derek, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, BAMF Stiles, Banshee Lydia Martin, But He Gets Better, Custody Battle, Dead Claudia Stilinski, Dead Hales, Derek Has Feelings, Derek and Stiles are Mates, Derek is a Good Alpha, Derek waits till the last second to use his words, Domestic God Derek, Drive thrus, Druids, Druids aren't always impartial, Emissary Stiles Stilinski, Epic Bromance, F/M, Fanart, Government Conspiracy, I can show you the world, Lots of Sex, M/M, Magical Claudia Stilinski, Multi, Oblivious Stiles, Oracle Boyd, Original Character(s), Other, Pining Derek, Pixie Scott, Post Hale Fire, Pranks and Practical Jokes, Preceded by epic sex, Scott McCall & Stiles Stilinski Friendship, Scott is a Good Friend, Sheriff Stilinski is a Bad Parent, Stiles is Derek's Anchor, Talia Hale & Claudia Stilinski Friendship, The sheriff's name is Nikodem, Threesome, Vampyr Erica, War, Wiccan Stiles, World Domination, dragons are real, original child character - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-31
Updated: 2016-01-25
Packaged: 2018-04-12 23:01:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 21
Words: 155,696
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4498002
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alteringviews/pseuds/vixenviews
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Three years ago, Stiles left Beacon Hills looking for answers to the magical clusterfuck he'd become. Now he's returned to find that the Alpha has changed, his best friend is a ranking pack member, and Jackson is an emotionally screwed faerie. Yet, Beacon Hills hasn't changed a bit. </p><p>Lenara says it's because it was waiting for the last piece on the board to return to its proper position. And even though she's a bit of a pervy gmilf (but seriously how old is she?), she's always right. But it can't ever be as simple as that because Stiles has been hiding behind masks for so long, he isn't sure who he is any longer.</p><p>Between Counsel designs, forgotten memories, the unstable barrier, magical catastrophes, and residual insecurities, Stiles, Derek, and the Beacon Pack must come into themselves, their place in Beacon Hills and trust each other if they want to make it out alive.</p><p>Curtains back, masks on...Let the show begin.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> This is sort of a collab that was inspired by youtube and then spiraled way out of control.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The masks we wear  
> To make ourselves true  
> Are the lies we tell  
> To bear the pain.  
> Yet, in time,  
> We all find  
> The masks never hid anything at all.

His babcia Hieronim smiled at him as he came down the stairs today...well, actually, he tripped rather than tumbled so he assumed that was progress. She clapped and smiled at him warmly. Not that she didn’t smile at him every morning or every time she saw him, but today was a little special. He'd been here in Poland with her for three years... well most of three years--well, some of three years if he was honest... more like about 10% of the three years and that was being kind about it.  She and his Uncle Ivan _did_ deport his ass to a were-dragon tribe and a few other clans, tribes, packs, etc. to learn about their special brand of magic after the first month of being there. He'd done a lot of learning, a lot of ducking, and a whole lot of flying. He'd liked the flying the best and learning things that had probably been outlawed in Magic Academies for _centuries_ had been more than worth skipping the barrage of applications he would have had to fill out. Not to mention the uniforms, the sneering, the popularity contests, the magical stupidity and the complete lack of peace and quiet that would have come with an Academy... No, he would never regret not even attempting to enroll the way his mother had, especially since it had been a kick in the counsel's teeth and apparently being pissed off with the Counsel was a family tradition. It had probably paid more homage to his late mother's memory than going to her alma mater. The day he sent off his rejection letter, he was sure he'd heard her laughing with glee at the look he imagined the Council members gave his letter.

They had been priceless and they still were. He wasn’t sure what had made him happier, sending the letter or all the follow-up letters he still receives and keeps as a very nice collection of in-case-of-emergency toilet paper.

Bastards should have seen it coming after what they'd done to him... after what they hadn't done _for_ him. They should have been glad he even gave them a response of any kind that wasn't of the magical “fuck you” sort.

After that which-would-be-thrown-under-a-rug-and-never-spoken-of-again-along-with-Stiles, he'd been angry and hurt and so full of residual chaos magic that he would have gladly strode through all the barriers around the Beacon Hills Nemeton, flimsy as they were, crucified himself  on it roots and bled out to the sound of the end of existence as they knew it. He was sure there were plenty of things trapped besides the demon that had ruined his life and plenty more that would be drawn towards the beacon in the future. Needless to say, it was probably better for everyone involved that he'd wrote to his Babcia for an escape. Topped with food and an extensive visit with his mother's family, it was enough to do his soul good and to aid in his mental recovery.

When he’d come to Poland, he hadn’t even recognized himself in the mirror, let alone when he woke up. Everything had felt so _surreal_ that there were days he’d walked outside in hardly any clothing just to be sure that he was somewhere on the physical plane and not some formless spirit of chaos or chance. His babcia had not been happy with him about it and had always come out to wrap him up in something that was warm, smelled like a fireplace and shoved a cup of hot chocolate in his hands. They never talked about it though. Hieronims weren't terribly receptive to therapy in the traditional sense making the natural Wiccan resistance even stronger. They were one of the oldest bloodlines, the strongest and one of the five that had survived the centuries of persecution and poaching since Merlin died....They also happened to be direct descendants, so most of the supernatural community knew, at the very least, that no one knew more about Wiccan suffering than a Hieronim.

Despite all that, and maybe because his father never considered Stiles to be a Hieronim, he'd spent most of his junior year in a psych ward for supernaturals, the Eichen House to be specific, until the explosions, until the kidnapping. Until the sword and fire, the chaos reign and the woods that screamed his mother's lullabies along with her dying words. How they'd known them was beyond him as it had taken months to even find out where she died in all the chaos after the raising of the barrier. Beacon Hills had immortalized her likeness along with Talia Hale's in the territory museum and she'd become little more than a myth. But people remembered Claudia Stilinski's death like old newspaper obituaries: vague, sweeping details and a stale, inked sense of loss and pity for the Sheriff who was now the sole parent to a stupid kid with a magical disorder...Strange as it was...no one ever thought they were the same person.

It had been one of the first things he'd thought about when he'd woken up in the ICU of the hospital in May. It had been the day before graduation. Scott and his father looked at him the same way he'd gone to sleep months before: in 5 point magical restraints and the vaguest recollection that he'd been made to do something terrible. He had only asked if it was all over then.

“ _Yeah,_ ” Scott gasped. “ _It’s over…_ ”

Scott hadn’t gone to walk across the stage, neither had Kira. His father sat at his bedside, silent and gripping his hand. They weren’t crying, but the tears hung in the air, salty and invisible. It had made him sick.

The only redeeming factor of the whole ordeal was that his babcia loved having him around, being able to see him and worry about him directly. Having him to help around the house, to go on missions with her... it had been like having Claudia back for a little while. He wasn't sure the sentiment warmed or burned him more. He would never be as great as Claudia Hieronim had been, but he always thanked her for the comparison. Being in his mother's childhood home had let him see all the ghosts of his mother's life before America. It had felt like he was learning about her in all the ways that no one, no matter how many trips to the museum they took, would know her...He spent a lot of time following his mother's five year old self wandering the area around the Hieronim estate. Her older selves were always in town getting into trouble, casting spells, helping people in need.

It was time now, though. He'd done all he could on this side of the world, learned and healed all he could. Not to mention that three years was a long time for his father to survive on the little cooking guidance Stiles had been able to impart to him before leaving. It was even longer for his Pixie best friend to be left alone in Beacon Hills without Stiles' strong but spastic--borderline psychotic-- guidance to get him through the hard times and to help him pull his latest prank.

Today was his last day in Poland. He was going home.

"Tell your father that he'd better take good care of you or he'll have me to contend with," she'd said. "And if that Council doesn't get its head out of its ass, they'll have to deal with all of us."

He snorted, "No one puts Baby in a corner?"

She nodded, "Especially not Claudia's baby... you look more and more like her every day."

He only smiled. She’d said that nearly every day he was there with that same proud misty expression. It always made his eyes burn. At least when she said it, she meant it in the most loving way possible… When his uncles mentioned their baby sister, it was always to make fun of him. They’d learned quickly that her physical features were only the tip of what else he’d inherited from her: her temper, her wit, and of course her penchant for revenge. At every hex, they laughed that misty-eyed laugh and did their best not to look hurt.

He looked just like her, acted like her, sometimes he even sounded like her... but Stiles was Stiles and Claudia was never coming back...There was no resurrection spell that could give solid form to a spirit of the air.

 _Thanks_ , he thought at his babcia and about his uncle's remarks. Red-blooded, still a virgin, teenage _boy_ Stiles always wanted to look like the dark eyed angel that had been Claudia Hieronim. He knew it would have been world's easier if he was just a girl, but they hadn't made a spell for that and he rather liked the easily accessible fuck toy between his legs. Stiles' dexterity was only applicable to two things after all: spell casting and video games. He was pretty sure that tampons or rummaging around inside himself for a hard to reach, _are you sure it exists?_ spot, for just a bit of mental clarity from the storm of magic and hormones in his system would have ended his life long before anything else could.  He sighed, he'd accepted it. His high school years of wearing the buzz cut and trying to harden his baby face had been wasted... a lot of things had been wasted really. It had taken him at least a year in Poland, freezing his ass off, to figure that out.

For one, his mother had worn a buzz cut for a very long time and her hair, as long as he remembered it, was always shorter than shoulder length. His short hair cuts hadn't helped his manly look at all, but of course there were other things... Like he hadn't eaten nearly enough curly fries in high school because he was sure that they would be a staple in his life--obviously nearly a year in the Eichen house cleared that misconception up and if not three years without them had definitely done the trick.

For three, Lydia would have never talked to him even if he went right up to her and kissed her, it wouldn't have happened. As brilliant as she was, she hadn't realized how stupid she was... or how wrapped up in her appearance to realize how brilliant she could be. He secretly bet that was part of the reason that he'd believed he'd liked her so much: they were peas in a pod.

And fourth, but definitely not last, it had been his own desperate need to be wanted, his inferiority complex, and fear of rejection that kept him at the back of the class though at the top. That made the counsel throw him away without even looking into his records and have to back pedal so fast that their heads spun--because _yes_ Stiles Stilinski wasn't his real name.  Those things had also kept Scott as his only friend and made him a perfect target for possession of a Nogitsune. A perfect nest of chaos and despair...

He blew out and breath at that realization. That one had been the first to punch him in the gut honestly and it had made him run all the way to Poland to try and escape it. But again, three years is a long time. And three years of bouncing around Europe in between tribes, gangs, mobs, packs and clans to learn and commune with the magical world had given him a fuck ton of time to reflect and a whole lot more to grow up.

He wondered if Scott had done the same, if Lydia had finally married that dickhead Jackson, if maybe even Jackson had pulled the stick out of his ass... If maybe everyone had forgotten. He hadn't checked the news and promised himself that he wouldn't. It was better to just breathe and bid his family goodbye before catching the 6 am magic rail into town and heading towards the portal.

He smiled at the man manning the booth, who looked somewhere in between a Pixie and a were-rabbit. He wasn't sure how, but it was something about his hair and the twitching of his nose that did it. Nikolai was always the first person anyone saw leaving or coming into Warsaw Magic Station.  He spoke most languages known to man and if he didn't he learned it within minutes of talking to someone. It was a nifty trick that Stiles had gotten him to teach him his first trip out of Warsaw. Apparently, Stiles was one of the few people that had ever stopped to talk to the old man in the centuries he'd held that position. They became fast friends especially after his Babcia had introduced him as her grandson.

"And where are you headed to now, Stiles?"

"Well Nikolai... I'm headed home."

He nodded and checked his paperwork before stamping the seal of the Poland West Territory and handed it back to him with a proud and misty smile.

"We hope to see you again soon."

Stiles wasn't sure if he could agree with that but smiled and nodded. Coming back to Poland would mean something else disastrous happened while he was in Beacon Hills and he wasn't sure if he could handle another run in with disaster to that degree. He stepped on the magic circle, breathed deep, took a look at the Warsaw station and bidding it farewell.

_Until the next time his life was in chaos..._

Until the next time.

He closed his eyes and let magic seep down to activate the circle transport. They had just fixed it after realizing that there was a glyph missing. He'd told his babcia to mention it in the town meeting. The elements of magic and the universe stirred and gathered around him and for just a moment his mind was at ease, his heart asoar, and his spirit was one with the universe of the physical and spiritual planes. His senses were alive with it all and as he floated back down into corporeal reality, he staved off the customary panic when the lower plains watched him sail by. Three years wasn't enough to forget him, if anything they had become more aware of him the more he passed through plains.

When he arrives, it’s dark in Beacon Hills at the height of summer. The air is thick and humid and he can practically taste the shore. To make matters better, it’s night time and slowly trudging towards the crazy hour and no one knows he’s here… except the man manning the checkpoint.

He didn’t recognize him, nor did the man recognize him, but he had a sort of gruff, angry look about him as Stiles handed over his passport and waited for the man to shine a light in his eyes as he glanced over the document.

“What brings you to Beacon Hills?” the man asked.

“I’m coming home,” he said.

The man sucked on his teeth and Stiles wanted to tell him that he’d seen a better bad cop routine from a five year old, but he’d grown since his high school self and only waited for the man to wave him through the checkpoint. As he passed, he read the welcome sign and couldn’t help but feel his mouth twitch.

“Welcome to Beacon Hills”, it said. “When you lose your way, follow the beacon in the hills.”


	2. Homecoming

He continued walking towards the woods, past the shuttle bus that would have taken him into town. He didn’t want that, just wanted to get a feel for the place again and walk the ley lines towards his house. The old Stilinski house still stood as tall as it had when he left in all its majesty. The house was well over a hundred years old, having been a gift from the Druids that had once controlled the Nemeton. The same Druids that his mother and Talia Hale had protected from the swarms of rogue spirits and outlaws that had been destroying their camp. Even before the Nemeton was created, Beacon Hills had attracted trouble, but the counsel in all their infinite pride had forgone declaring the area a territory. Claudia and Talia had decided to take it upon themselves to not only make it a territory, but make it _their_ territory.

That was almost two hundred years ago.

The Counsel still smarted from that insult even now that both women were dead. Partially, because the order that they’d established still held strong without any sign of wavering… and mostly because they were pissed off that they didn’t think of it first. After all, Beacon Hills attracted every kind of supernatural, which made it a magic hub, the perfect training ground for Council military, and the perfect poaching ground.

“Looks like Dad’s been taking good care of you,” he said and felt the wind caress his cheek. “I hope you’ve been watching over him as much as you watch over me…”

There was a wry laugh in the wind then and he walked towards the house. He twisted the knob and felt the house recognize and welcome him before it opened to an uncanny den. Nothing much had changed except maybe the wall paper. When Nikodem Stilinski worried and he had no one to directly worry about, he did maintenance work around the house. While a Wiccan, he’d been superbly ungifted with most magics. It was part of the reason that Stiles was able to exist under the radar for so long. He was the son of Nikodem Stilinski and the mysteries Claudia Stilinski who no one really knew. And maybe part of him believed that as soon as he grew out of his M.D.I., he’d become as superbly untalented with magic as his father was. He tried his best not to dwell on the dread that swelled in him thinking about the seemingly always imminent day.

He walked up the stairs to his old bedroom that had been a lot cleaner than he remembered it. He guessed that his father had really been worried. His books were organized on their shelves, the room had been dusted. How many days had his father slept in this room? How many nights? How long had it taken him to be okay with Stiles being gone? If he was ever? Had he cleaned it thinking that every day could be the day Stiles came home?

The thoughts warmed and chilled him. What if he'd never come home?

Stiles set his bag down on the bed and looked around the room, the books, the computer; everything was, more or less, exactly where he left it. Even the clothes in their drawers, all washed and folded (more or less) in their drawers. Nikodem didn’t do laundry, he wondered who was doing it while he was gone. Sure, he'd charmed his father's clothes to wash themselves but three years meant at least half of a new wardrobe.

He shook his head. It didn’t matter so long as it was getting done. He headed back down the stairs towards the kitchen, stopping only in the living room to nod to the blown up picture of them all together. He’d been a baby, all big brown eyes and a gummy smile in Claudia’s arms. She was wearing the same cloak that she’d given him before she died. Her hair cropped as short as Stiles’s hair was now. Damn, he did look like her, it was amazing that people didn't note the resemblance. But, then again Claudia Hieronim was a goddess and Stiles was a smart-mouthed fuck up. He wondered sometimes that if she’d been wearing it when she’d left that evening if she would still be here.

He shook his head and continued on as soon as the thought has made a mess of his insides. There's no place here and now for those thoughts. She had left the plane in a sense, but she was always there, every time he turned around. The laundry room was still running the same as when he left it. Clothes sorted into neat piles, the dryer rolled on.

The dishes were all clean, but true to his prediction, the bathrooms had fallen behind a bit. Years old mildew flowered in the bathroom in the hall.  No one had been using it so the enchantments drifted. He stepped in to the bathroom and watched the spell come to life and begin to clean it.  He closed the door before heading back to the kitchen.

“Let’s see if Dad’s been taking care of himself while I’ve been away…”

He opened the door as the wind giggled past his ear and shook his head. There looked to be the last remnants of salad from a store, wilting and unhappy, and roast beef that looked suspiciously like Melissa McCall’s roast beef. The fact that he wasn’t home yet, meant he was working overtime again. He reached in to pull what was left out and packed a Tupperware container of a rounded meal before letting it scrub itself clean. He didn’t bother to change, only slip out of the heavy cloak and coat he wore and head back out of the house. Pulling up the hood of his light jacket, he gathered spirits of the air around him and floated into the sky towards the alley behind the station. When he landed, he walked in through the back door and through the bullpen towards the front desk, taking his usual path towards the Sheriff's office.

“Who are you--Stiles?”

He pulled his hood down and turned to Parrish who blinked in shock before rushing towards him to grip his shoulders. Stiles tensed at first contact, but breathed. Parrish was a low level Pixie, no need to worry.

“Really? Stiles.”

“The one and only, where’s my old man?”

“In his office.”

Stiles nodded and headed that way. He knocked and cleared his throat.

"Sheriff?"

"Jackson, you got that--"

The door opened and Nikodem Stilinski was sure of only one thing: that was not Deputy Jackson. Had Stiles' voice always sounded like that or had he made it sound that way? Stiles had been great at imitations. Had he gotten taller? Broader? No, he was still as lithe as his mother had been and just as sassy he bet. By Merlin, he looked just like his mother right down to the hair. He swore he was hallucinating. It was the lean and the wry smirk that gave him away and made his hands tremble. The pen fell from his hands and his throat tightened, his eyes burned.

"Stiles..."

He grinned and walked in closing the door to deposit the bag in his hand on the table, waiting, taking deep breath as his father stood.

"I didn't know you were coming..."

"Surprise! You get a whole Stiles for no reason other than to have one. It's your lucky day!"

Nikodem was around the desk and embracing him tightly and Stiles smiled as the bit of apprehension Stiles was feeling had disappeared. He could hug people again; people could touch him again... Good. He squeezed his father back counting the moments before he felt the telltale shift that meant he was losing his control. His father was fairly low class when it came to magic so that may have meant it would take longer.

"You coming home?"

"My bags are there," he said. "Nowhere else to go for now."

Nikodem laughed. That hadn't been the answer he wanted but it was the one he expected. Stiles told him that he'd catch him at home and there would be breakfast involved if he was lucky. Nikodem nodded and forced himself to sit down as Stiles left.

"Love you, Dad." He said. "I'll see you at home."

He nodded and held his breath as the door closed. It came out on a shuddered breath and he regarded the bag on his desk and swallowed. It was Melissa’s roast beef which meant Stiles hadn't cooked so he hadn't  been back long enough to go shopping. He opened his computer to search for the passage log and found him. He'd been back for all of thirty minutes... and the police station had to be the first stop. It warmed him and left him cold. He hadn't said how long he would stay upon entry or when he was there.... Nikodem wasn't sure if he could take another three years or more.

***

Stiles knew his father was probably worrying another set of lines in his forehead. The reunion had gone better than he dreamed of. No yelling, no anger, just shock... much better. Maybe that would take that one nightmare off the docket. Maybe--

Stiles stepped to one side drawing a spell to his fingertips as he whirled to face the person rushing towards him, but he heard the voice and the spell dissipated. No one would notice the full on dragon-rage grade assault he'd been conjuring.

"Stiles!"

He got arms wrapped around him, squeezing and lifting him from the ground and laughing. It was Scott. One of the only people that had insisted on hugging him even when he'd been physically quarantined. His favorite Pixie had gotten taller, put on more muscle and grew into his magic well. In his excitement, sparkling white Pixie dust fluttered off the top of his head and surrounded them. He was sure there would be flowers of some sort growing through the linoleum or maybe it would just gleam a little more. Pixies were known for beautification and flowers, the more deadly side of their magic involved large plant things dissolving living beings into forest fodder. It had been for a long time the coolest thing Scott could do. Stiles wondered if it still was or if he'd got to try the sinkhole of death to the underworld.

Stiles heard himself laughing, squeezing Scott as Scott squeezed and whirled him around. Then he was on the ground and Scott was talking quick words and gripping his shoulders looking at him. Stiles felt the words tumbling out his mouth about the same thing. Somehow, they were planning their reunion prank and the acquisition of curly fries. The words were coming so fast that the people around them only tilted their heads in confusion. Leave it up to fast-talking, smart mouth Stiles to be able to keep up with a Pixie. That wasn't a Wiccan trick either it was all Stiles. They heard Parrish, another Pixie who could more or less follow the conversation, beg them to not do anything too drastic.

They made no guarantees but they would be fairly tame pranks honestly.

First, they covered the Stilinski House in pink and yellow tulips, if only for old time's sake. They were his father’s favorite flower, only because it had been his mother’s favorite flower. As angry as Nikodem  would pretend to be, he would laugh in secret. They went through four drive throughs of flooding the window with flowers and Disney songs.

 After Scott had created a bed of flowers and Stiles had conjured a white cloak to wear and climbed on top of the floating mass, it was too easy... it wasn't even three o'clock in the morning yet...

"Beacon Fries, home of the best curly fries this side of the Andes, how may I help you?"

"I would like 30 orders of curly fries...and two burgers."

Scott said calmly into the speaker. Beacon Fries made the best curly fries and burgers in all of Beacon Hills so it was of course the only place that would serve as a proper stage for the last prank of the night.

"Please pull up to the window..."

Stiles set the carpet to float forward, lounging in the bed of flowers.

It was about two forty-five in the morning which meant the crazies were slowly tricky out of their drug dens for fried food, but this isn't what she expected. A hand thrust towards her and the scent of bluebonnet flowers in the air, floating around the man lounging on a bed of those same flowers. His face was pale, dotted with moles... he was the perfect twink really. She almost mistook him for a girl.

"Fly with me, Cocina!"

She blinked trying to wrap her head around what was happening, hearing the sound of the deep fryer behind her and the grill. Oh boy, this was going to be one of those nights? If she'd  known she would have brought her flask.

"I can show you the world... shining shimmering splendid... Tell me Kathryn, when did you last let your heart decide..."

On the wind, money fluttered in. At least this crazy was paying.... for all the curly fries she currently had in stock. She went to make change and call the cops though she knew somewhere in her it would make no difference.

"This is Beacon Hills Police Station, what's your emergency?"

"There is a drunk guy, probably a Pixie throwing flowers into the drive through window and singing A Whole New World…”

She heard the officer sigh and tell her that they would send someone over as soon as possible.

The man on the bed of flowers had launched into the second verse as she was handing over bags of curly fries.

“Scott.”

Scott tensed up and the little shimmer of pixie dust faded as he regarded his alpha, one Derek Hale. Dressed in his customary jeans and t-shirt, he looked more than upset. Stiles, none the wiser, was still singing to the drive through girl, Kathryn in between bites of curly fries.

“What,” he started. “Are you doing?”

Scott smiled nervously, his alpha’s eyes were doing the red glowing thing again and Pixies didn’t do well under stress.

“Well… my buddy is back and we… were…”

“Pulling a prank?”

“Several in fact,” Stiles corrected and carried on with his singing.

“And the curly fries?” Derek asked regarding the bags Stiles was piling on the bed of flowers he floated on.

“Well… they’re his favorite.”

“He must be the infamous, Stiles Stilinski.”

Stiles hopped down to give a deep bow and throw his cape back, “You rang?”

Derek gave him only a glance. This was Stiles? The second half of the prank Duo that had plagued Beacon Hills for years? He’d met him before when they were all children, and in school but to his eyes nothing had really changed. Thinner than Scott, shorter than Scott with a sort of nervous energy bounding through and around him. He seemed to shimmer just a bit and his scent was slightly sweet, yet calming and familiar...He wondered how many more pixies this territory could handle? Scott had been a handful all on his own and didn't Pixies usually smell like some sort of confection? Scott smelled like cinnamon rolls all the time. His mother Melissa always smelled like pineapple upside-down cake and every other pixie he'd ever known smelled like a sweet. Stiles didn't, he didn't particularly smell like any one species either, but his scent was phantasmic to Derek’s senses, teasing the edges of his memories. There was a distinct lack of magic to his smell, but different than someone like Nikodem. There was almost a void of it around him.

“Don’t be late for patrols, Scott. Leandra has informed me that another hole has appeared in the barrier to the West. Lenara is looking into it. “

Scott winced and glanced apologetically at Stiles who felt frozen where he stood. Another hole in the barrier, another hole in the barrier… Another…

“She says it isn’t very large, but a crack can always be made bigger,” Derek said and tried his best not to address the difference of scent coming off the skinny, defenseless looking lad in the cloak of flowers.

“Right, I won’t be…”

Derek nodded and turned to leave before turning back to them, “And clean this up before you do?”

Scott nodded before Derek turned, nodding his goodbye before disappearing into the night. Scott heard the roar of his Camaro and it head down the street. Scott turned to Stiles who’d turned around to retrieve another bag of curly fried, completing the large stockpile resting on top of the floating bed of flowers.

Stiles climbed on top of it, thanking the woman in the window, “Our love affair was a short and passionate one, dear Kathryn. I will always love the drive through girl who gave me curly fries.”

She laughed helplessly at him as Scott climbed on the bed of flowers, finding that it was as solid as a slab before Stiles gestured.

“On ward! beyond the horizon!”

Scott laughed as the bed began to float forward at a snail's pace and they began to eat their small treasure trove of curly fries and the two burgers… Stiles mostly ate curly fries so Scott could get to the burgers.

“So,” Stiles started. “You got yourself into Beacon Pack? Must have scored really high on those aptitude tests!”

After all the Beacon Pack carried the legacy of Talia Hale and Claudia Hieronim as one of the strongest and most influential pack. There wasn't a territory in existence that hadn't heard of it. Applications probably flooded the Council and then the current Alpha as well. When he was in Beacon Hills, he remembered the process being extraordinarily difficult with all the changes and the residual chaos. He knew several people who'd applied to become a part of the pack yet had not made it in. No doubt that Derek was either extremely selective, or not really taking applications. 

If the barrier was crumbling, he bet on the former. 

He nodded, “Got recruited more like it, but they’re good people. Derek’s a good alpha.”

“Derek Hale?”

Scott nodded and Stiles nodded. He expected as much, since it was in fact still a Pack. When Laura had been murdered, he figured that the last remaining Hale would step up to fill the void. The Council must have been desperate, or hopeful that they could control the young son of Talia Hale to let it happen. It was probably a good plan: all the power, the lineage, the prestige and none of the sass. Somehow, he doubted that Derek was the easily controlled type. If anything, he probably made it his life’s mission to drive the Council crazy. Stiles could get behind that, perhaps they could be friends if he wasn't so grumpy all the time.

Scott told him just about everything that he’d missed while he was overseas and their last year of high school, filling him in on the goings on. Lydia was still with Jackson. His advice to woo Kira with his flower tricks had gone over well and they were dating. It was true that Derek had developed a reputation for declining applications, there was a rumor going around that if he couldn't get through the first sentence of your application he would toss it. And Scott had been recruited into the Beacon Pack along with Kira. With that came the truth: Derek read all applications all the way through and then asked about the applicant around their home territory and consulted Lenara on the matter. It seemed that at large, most just hadn't been up to par. 

“I told you, who’s the greatest?”

He laughed, “I have a shrine in your honor.”

“I demand an image in my likeness made of curly fries.”

Scott shook his head, “I don’t think that would stand up so well to time--”

“It will be remade every day after I have consumed the offering.”

Scott snorted his eyes flickering over Stiles’ face. Not much had really changed from the Stiles that he’d known before senior year. His face was still soft, round, he would never say girly though he was sure that people thought it often. He didn’t have the square jaw look as he looked far too much like his mother. Hell, if Stiles let his hair grow out a little longer, he’d be the spitting image of her, but Scott would never tell him that either.

Instead, he told them about the Pack. Erica the vampyr who fed on stress, gloom, trauma and other negative emotions was one of the most optimistic people Scott had ever met. She'd been turned near the end of high school and in her sorrow and rage had still chosen to join the Beacon Pack and trust them all to look after her, more importantly she didn't let the asshole of a stepfather and years of foster vampyr care abuse stop her from loving.  She came to Beacon Hills around their junior year and had been taken in by Lenara. Boyd the oracle, and Erica's boyfriend, was laconic but a powerful oracle that held an extraordinary amount of control over his visions. He also happened to be one of Derek's closest friends. Despite his appearance, he was extremely laid back and genuinely a good person. They made a very interesting pair. 

Isaac the werewolf who'd been turned while his family had escaped from a territory that allowed the hunting of humans in the North, was a snarky with friends and rather reserved with anyone else. His family had been killed during the escape as the Alpha had either ripped them to shreds or the bite had not taken. Isaac had survived and found asylum in Beacon Hills with the Beacon Pack, with Derek. Neither one of them talked about the details of the escape or why Isaac had haunted tortured look about him sometimes, but he was officially a part of the pack.

Kira the Kitsune who Stiles remembered vaguely from senior year, she'd been nice when she transferred in junior year and Scott had crushed on her for months after his relationship with Allison crashed and burned. She came from a family of Kitsune who had just moved from japan. He remembered being a hell of a wingman and talking Scott up to her in japanese. She'd been fun and quick-witted, perfect for Scott really.

Scott the awesome Pixie who Stiles already had a lengthy mental dossier of, hadn’t changed too much. Lydia, Stiles's former crush, the Banshee (sometimes more metaphorical than literal if Scott had to tell the truth) and of course Jackson…

“The what?”

“He’s a fairy Stiles,” Scott told him. “Imagine my surprise when he shifted…”

Stiles blinked and all at once it came, a great roaring laughter that he fell back and through the bed of flowers and on to the forest floor. Scott and the empty bags of food fell down with him--the enchantment broken as Stiles rolled around on the ground.

“I can’t! A fairy! A fairy!? Big bad Jackson is a fairy?! How did we not know that?”

Scott shrugged as Stiles’s laughter died down to a petulant giggle. Mind you, no one really said anything about what they were unless it was obvious. Lycans were usually obvious--generally territorial and prone to taking their aggravation out on the field. Werewolves tended to be out during the full moons and sickened during the new moon where Lycans had less of those problems. Pixies were more than obvious in their scent and at a certain point they left trails of pixie dust and forestry behind them. And Banshees, depending on the strength of their powers were usually prone to random screaming fits and something like panic attacks. Vampyrs usual stuck out in high school as they always looked as though they were moments away from dragging someone into a closet and banging them senseless. At a certain point, Stiles had wished more than anything to be the victim of a vampyr, but it never happened--obviously.

High schools had been set up to equally cover human and supernatural curriculum. Most humans only took introductory courses unless they were going to be an emissary or leader of a Mob. For the rest of the population, they were sometimes divided by species i.e. lycans and werewolves usually had the same classes, Pixies and fairies were usually grouped together, if only for practical purposes. For the most part however, you were allowed to take whatever you wanted. Their school IDs said nothing about their species or powers, only their grade level. It wasn’t that hard to get out of high school without anyone knowing what exactly you were.

Hell, he was sure that if his father wasn’t so well known, Stiles would still be the boy they whispered about. Most people knew he was at least half-Wiccan, though they had no real idea what the other half of him was. Mrs. Stilinski had never been seen performing magic or doing anything really, so most presumed her human. It played in his favor honestly, he was sure that it was the only reason that his mother had done it. What could she be protecting him from that she'd created a whole separate identity for herself? He remembered the golem look alike that made its appearance while she was away. It had taken him to school and to the normally magically inclined she just seemed like a friendly human. More importantly, schools didn't require you to do magic in Beacon Hills. Your family was mostly responsible for controlling your magical abilities and any other higher-level skills could be taught if requested. The territory's school system revolved around people being comfortable in what and who they were. If someone wanted to train for the military, then they'd request a tutor and it would affect their standing. 

In other territories, the ability to utilize your innate gifts was integral to the curriculum. It was usually the standard in territories run by the Council. What they needed ready made soldiers for, no one knew, but Talia and Claudia had stuck to their principals: let children be children for as long as they can.

Scott checked his watch, “Looks like it’s almost time for patrols. I’d better get going. I’ll catch you tomorrow though right? After jetlag has taken hold? The bromance must be returned to its former glory.”

"To its former borderline homosexual glory?" Stiles nodded, “Definitely, you don’t think a few hours is enough to make up for three plus years do you? There was no hot oil involved...”

Scott shook his head, “Never.”

Stiles laughed and accepted the hug and concentrated on keeping his ley lines from shifting and his body relaxed. Scott stepped back and Stiles offered him a lift.

Scott grinned, “Thanks man. Where’s your--”

His voice broke off as they began to ascend about the tree line and Stiles’s hand was glowing around his own. He looked down.

“Put me down.”

“You want me to put you down, right now?”

“If you do, I will t.p. your room in poison Ivy.”

Stiles laughed and guided them on the air currents towards the edge of the barrier, he set them down a good distance from the clearing that was the patrol trading place and gave Scott one last hug before turning to head back through the forest.

He stopped for just a moment and regarded the familiar looking vehicle in the clearing.

“Is that Jackson’s car?”

Scott nodded, “It is.”

“Get it,” Stiles said with an evil grin. “Roses with thorns, man.”

“Wouldn’t that be doing him a favor?”

“Not when she gets pricked by the thorns.”

Scott nodded, throwing a handful of pixie dust over the car and watching the masterpiece unfold. Stiles stayed until the flowers blossomed and the thick vines barred all entry. He grinned. It felt good to be mean sometimes.

“I’ll see you later.”

Scott nodded, chuckling as he headed on his usual route along the barrier. Stiles watched him go for just a moment before heading back into the forest. The holes in the Beacon Hills barrier were growing in number and size. After his mother had died, it had held so strongly but sometime in his senior year it had begun to grow thin and threadbare. He remembered when the first hole appeared. It had been tiny, almost insignificant, but big enough for a spell to slip through and cause an epidemic in that section of the territory. The magic of the Hostiles that surrounded Beacon Hills was treacherous and always trying to into the territory. To Stiles's knowledge, that had been the beginning of the outposts in every city. They were meant to act as another line of defense against malicious magic and keep an eye on the barrier. 

The pack had grown and trained to face the inevitable war that would break out when the barrier finally crumbled. Even from the distance, Stiles could feel the eyes of the Hostiles peering through the barrier. 

 _Soon,_ they said, licking their teeth with feral grins.  _Soon._

_It's all your fault..._

He shook his head, the void was still there at the corners of his mind. Once a portal, always portal he knew. The depth of emotional turmoil didn’t go away, it clung to his mind and soul, his body and smelled like chaos and sugar to those from below. It had been one of the main reasons that he did so much wandering rather than gate hoping while overseas. It was less dangerous for him and even with the amount of poaching and criminals in the Hostiles, it was a better alternative than being a demon’s portal to this world again.

He took another breath, feeling his ley lines beginning to shift. Being himself and remaining stable meant it was imperative that he stayed emotionally aware and address all of his issues  as they arose. The main cause of it had been the emotional blind spots left by his mother's death and the odd relationship he had with Scott and his father.

He walked the ley lines through the forest and back towards town. He stopped at the grocery store to buy groceries for the house, chatted with the woman behind the counter whom he went to school with. She was a little wary of him, but when he told her that he wasn't going to wig out on her and pour milk over his head and rub it into his skin unless he was getting paid for it she relaxed if only little. With his arms full, he headed back to the Stilinski house. Nikodem wasn't home yet which meant he had enough time to make breakfast and there was no reason to make the tulips disappear.

***

He checked on the clothes to find them clean and smelling fresh. He threw them in the dryer and started another load, before putting up the clothes and running around the house, cleaning and restocking all the rooms. Paper towels, toilet paper. He could have done it with magic, but at least physically he could burn off some of the energy that had been seeping into his skin since he arrived. The house was cleaned top to bottom and there were pancakes and bacon sizzling in the skillet.

***

Nikodem Stilinski ate the rest of the roast beef around midnight and when the call came in about flowers coming in through a drive through window, he knew that Scott and Stiles had run into each other. It was around nine in the morning when he was off shift and headed home. His heart thudding in his chest as he arrived at the Stilinski house, covered in pink and yellow tulips. It was artistic in the way only Stiles and Scott could be together. Apparently, in three years, nothing had changed and Nikodem Stilinski wasn't sure if it was a wife or a hell send... but he smiled all the same. Then, the fear gripped him as he rushed up the driveway. The smell of household cleaner and laundry detergent ambushed him and his heart trembled. He closed the door and rushed through the house, up the stairs to find Stiles’ door open and the room empty, no bag, he didn't dare open the closet, the bed hadn’t looked like it’d been slept in. The hallway was clean, the bathrooms were stocked with soap and paper towels, toilet paper. Towels were where they were supposed to be and he felt his eyes burning as he continued. His room was empty, but there was no missing the smell of cleaning products. The bathroom had probably been scrubbed clean, his bed had been made. The room was organized and vacuumed. The window was open and the vase he’d kept on the bedside table was filled with pink and yellow tulips.

He swallowed the lump in his throat, there hadn’t been a note. Stiles had left a note last time… Maybe he just hadn’t found it yet? Maybe that was the problem? He hadn’t been to the kitchen yet...It was the last place in the house….

Nikodem descended the stairs and walked slowly towards the kitchen, rounding the corner and he swore he was having a heart attack when the pain in his chest set in. There Stiles was in sweatpants and a thin t-shirt, barefoot. His hair was damp from a shower. He had a spatula in his left hand and the pan handle in his right, whistling a song that Nikodem hadn’t ever heard, but it didn’t matter. Stiles was there...still there like he'd  never left...and making Nikodem’s favorite breakfast.

Stiles looked up at him with a smile, “Morning, Dad.”

Nikodem advanced, wrapping his arms around him, effectively halting the cooking for a while. Stiles wrapped his arms around the man and squeezed.

“Still here,” he said softly. “I’m here.”

He nodded and squeezed tighter, _I can't lose you again_. Stiles didn’t need to hear him say it know what that hug meant. He’d learned to glean his father’s affections from actions alone after all.

Stiles nodded, “How about breakfast?”

Nikodem nodded shakily, pulling back to look at his son for just a moment before slowly retreating to the table. Stiles placed the stack of pancakes on the table when a knock sounded on the door.

“I’ve got it,” Stiles said, setting the plate of bacon and syrup on the table. He charmed the eggs to float towards the table before jogging to get the front door.

“Who is it?”

“It’s Melissa!”

He tilted his head and opened the door to see Melissa on the other side. She gasped looking at him and reaching for his face, to pat it, seemingly to register that it was solid and then let out a breath.

“Thank good ness! I thought Scott had lost his mind.”

He smiled at her and hugged her for a moment before welcoming her inside, “What happened?”

“He stopped off at the hospital to ask me to check his head, so sure that you’d been here. I thought finally his grief had gotten to him.”

Stiles nodded, “Nope, Stiles is here.”

She nodded gratefully, “I… see you two had a fun night…”

He grinned, “Yes, yes we did.”

Melissa took a seat and before Stiles could get her a glass another knock sounded at the door and then the turning of the knob and Stiles was sure it was Scott.

“Stiles! Stiles!”

“I’m in the kitchen.”

Scott came around the corner, catapulted himself on to Stiles and squeezed him tightly.

“I couldn’t sleep! I thought it was just a dream.”

Stiles shook his head and took a deep breath. Scott was trembling, his eyes burning.

“I missed you, bro…”

Stiles nodded, “I missed you too, Scott… But I’m hungry…”

Scott laughed and pulled back, “We’ll catch up. You’re not going anywhere are you?”

He shook his head, “For the record, I’ll be here indefinitely.”

Scott nodded and told him that he’d catch him later before running off to do whatever Pack thing he had to do.

“Speaking of… all the flowers Stiles?”

He grinned, “I thought they were a nice touch.”

“Clean it up will you?”

He promised with a grin before sitting down to eat at last. If there was someone else at the door it would just have to wait.

“So, what are you going to do while you’re here?” Melissa asked.

“Find a job, definitely… Something worthy of my skills.”

“You’re going to re-apply?”Nikodem asked, hopeful. 

“I was thinking something with mops…”

Nikodem blinked and Melissa laughed at Stiles’ mischievous grin.

“What?”

“Yeah and windows,” Stiles nodded. “That sounds right up my alley.”

It would be a waste of Stiles's heritage and knowledge to be a floor mopper. He could have worked for the Council, maybe he would never be an emissary because of his lack of magical skill but he would make a great librarian or consultant. But did Stiles have the focus to--Nikodem shook his head, finished eating, and headed up the stairs to catch a few hours of sleep. Melissa bid him goodbye, thanking him for washing her dish as Stiles set to washing the dishes and went upstairs to get dressed. Nikodem came down the hallway, rubbing his eyes and holding a letter.

“Just to let you know… This appeared on the mantle a few years ago, but I couldn’t get it down until yesterday. It’s from your mother.”

He swallowed and snorted, “The staff is blossoming enchanted letters now? Awesome.”

He took it and smiled at his Dad, “Sleep, tired old man. I’ll still be in Beacon Hills when you wake up.”

“I’ll hold you to that,” he warned and shuffled back to his bedroom. Stiles stored the letter with his mother’s cloak and headed down the steps. His phone and wallet in his pocket, he smiled at the mantle that held his mother’s staff, withered with age and lack of use beneath the picture of them all together.

They looked so happy staring back at the camera with grins so wide they were blinding.

“Love you too Mom,” he said softly, feeling a hand caress his cheek before he headed out the door. The lock clicked into place as he left the house and he cloaked himself in invisibility before lifting off into the sky. He landed on the edge of city proper and followed the ley lines towards the center to look around.

Taking a deep breath, he felt something stir in him.

He was home.


	3. Conflict and Strife

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Into the woods... and out of the dark.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: Shirtless Derek and Martyrdom a la seppuku (ish)

Scott met up with Kira at the Barracks, as they affectionately called them and practically bounced his way towards her. In reality, they were just the lofts that Derek bought, or inherited, they weren’t really sure how he came into possessing them. They looked more like warehouse buildings on the outside, but were fully furnished within and remodeled to be more like a very large house with tons of common spaces. Kira looked at him, dressed in her patrol gear, her sword across her back and smiled. She was as foxy as ever if he thought about it, but he wasn’t sure if he’d ever seen her not look as though she was prepared to leap into action. Even when he’d met her family and she’d been decked out in a traditional kimono at her birthday party, there was always an edge of danger to her. It could have been that her sword never left her side, but Scott liked to think that Kira was just permanently fixed in his pixie mind as always prepared to pounce. Foxes were predators right?

“What has you in such a good mood?” She asked.

“Besides my fox of a girlfriend?”

“Yes,” she laughed. “Besides me.”

“Stiles… is home!”

She nodded, she could have guessed from the way that Jackson had stormed through the forest, hot red fairy light coming off him like an angry firefly. He was sure that he was going to shrink into his tiny form and start yelling in that high-pitched squeak again.

“Is that why Jackson can’t get into his car?”

Scott winced, he’d forgotten about that. Stiles had a way of doing that.

“Do you think Derek--”

“Scott!”

He winced, _that_ answered his question. He turned to Derek who looked at him with that look, that _you are in so much trouble, but I know you can’t help yourself_ look. He wondered how close to pinching the bridge of his nose Derek was. He hung his head in submission. It was always like this, but to be fair…. Derek _had_ been warned by a number of people.

Scott's entrance into the pack had begun like this. He'd been so nervous that he couldn't concentrate on anything, which made it that much worse. Derek sent him to pick up groceries and he'd come back with the groceries and a ridiculous amount of cake for his nerves. Scott's mini-breakdown had been barely assuaged when Derek gave him the mission of landscaping the Hale House, the Barracks and Beacon City Hall. He'd promptly worked off all the sugar he'd consumed and that was one more thing Derek wouldn't have to manage. 

“I know you can’t help yourself,” Derek started, taking a deep breath, but his eyes were still red. “But could you please… let Jackson get into his car?”

“Sure,” Scott said. “Sorry, Derek…”

He shook his head, Melissa had warned him, but he still stands behind the fact that Scott would be, and is, an invaluable member of the Pack, even if he did cause more trouble than the average five year old. His aptitude tests had shown that much and Scott had the sort of character that made packs work. He could have been an emissary for his natural charm alone, the kind of emissary that didn’t really know much, but was always willing to help.  Not to mention, the other Pixie candidates weren’t exactly up to Derek’s standards. He shook his head, at least before there was only one of them. Now, with Stiles (whatever he was) here it seemed as though things were going to get more difficult.

The rose vines slithered off of Jackson’s car somewhere on the edge of the city as Scott took a seat on the couch and Kira fell down beside him comfortably.  Derek stood as usual, the smell of breakfast already made wafted through the air and pretty soon the rest of the Pack was moving in the daylight, roused by the smell of food.

Derek wanted to laugh occasionally, they were a bunch of college kids in some ways, all of them around the same age that Talia Hale and Claudia Hieronim had been when they’d made their name and tied themselves to the territory that was now called Beacon Hills.

Aurora was first in her Druid robes, the ones she slept in, to head into the kitchen for food. Derek told them all to behave before heading out for his normal run. Erica purred and licked her lips watching him leave. She’d been in a deep sleep it seemed and hadn’t fully woken up, running on vampyr instincts purely.

Derek was always tantalizing but as a usual rule, he didn’t let her feed on him unless it was a dire circumstance and she wasn’t too keen on tasting that depth of grief… No matter what her instincts said. For heaven’s sake, she didn’t want to embarrass herself even if the man could seriously use it. It wasn't good especially since he was a wolf, social creatures like lycans needed to be relieved of despair frequently to function properly, but Erica was sure that she would be drunk at first taste and wouldn’t know how to stop willingly and that wouldn’t have been good either.

As an Alpha, he had a bit more immunity to what lycans called “the lone wolf syndrome” or “pack madness”, as the natural instincts of an Alpha was to build a pack and take care of them, but not by much. While he’d built the pack, took care of them, there was still the sense that he wasn’t quiet free from the trauma of the past. He wasn’t letting himself be happy after all. Erica doubted that running multiple times a day would do the trick, no matter how well he’d been crutching along. There were other ways to fix it: druid rituals, Wiccan spells, sex was still her favorite, but, to her knowledge, Derek never employed any of those methods. He ran through the woods in his human form in daylight and full shift at night. Erica only hoped that he would find some other way to grieve before it destroyed him and they would be forced to take action.

Aurora was the next to leave, making the rest of the pack breathe a deep sigh of relief. For all their differences and tension, a strong dislike for Aurora was the one thing that they all had in common. She had to be the most annoying and high-strung Druid they’d ever met... not to mention _useless_. Erica had the sneaking suspicion that the Council had ulterior motives for assigning her to them. Sure, they were a young Pack made of fairly young members, but she seemed to be younger than all of them in terms of maturity and fighting capacities, as if she had not only not attended offensive magic for Druids, but even basic defensive spells were beyond her. They had yet to see her do a bit of magic or be of any real use and she was surprisingly good at disappearing in the middle of danger. An emissary’s job is to level out the pack, especially the Alpha… if anything Aurora seemed to be causing Derek more stress than she was alleviating.

“I really don’t like her,” Allison said after a moment and that made Isaac laugh.

“No one does, but we have to put up with her for now.”

The old _keep your enemies closer_ routine, they knew. That didn’t mean that they had to like it. But since it was Derek’s decision, they did have to respect it. They were just lucky that they hadn’t really needed an emissary to do much of anything. While Beacon Hills always had an influx of danger, none of it required any finesse because of the barrier. Derek needed her for political reasons because no other territory would take them seriously without an emissary.

Unfortunately, the time for the charade was ending. 

The barrier was dissolving at some unknowable rate, for some unnameable reason; and, to make matters worse, there was a meeting coming up in a week between Alphas and emissaries of their region and Beacon Hills was hosting it. It was probably the most excitement the city had seen in a while, let alone the territory.   It had already been decided that Scott would accompany Derek to the event as a temporary emissary partially because everyone loved a Pixie and he was the friendliest option. Jackson had wanted to go for the sheer prestige of it, but that idea had been nixed as fairies, like kitsune, had a bad reputation of being a tad untrustworthy… Even though that was only true for specific types of fairies, ones that they were generally sure Jackson was not a part of, they didn’t want to chance it.

Kira thought Lydia might have been a good candidate if only because she could look the part, but the social finesse of that meeting would have been too much for her and the metaphorical banshee would have shown through. Scott was really the only option and in between patrols and his normal activities around the territory, Scott studied up… as much as he could anyway. He’d never been particularly adept at studying, so Kira had really been feeding him information.

They ate breakfast and went their separate ways. The Pack had night watch, the police station took care of the day time and called when it was beyond the magical capacities which wasn’t frequent. Kira had a meeting with the Kitsune community in Beacon Hills so Scott bid her goodbye and headed directly for the Stilinski house. The door was locked, which meant no one was home and he frowned. Where could Stiles be if not at home?

He headed back into town to wander a bit, only to be told by several different sources that Stiles had been around, showing his face and visiting several people in the area. It was midday before Scott just figured it would be easier to look for him in the woods than anywhere else.

*

Stiles had gone around town to assure people that the rumors of him being back were true, to inform people that didn’t know, and to generally get a feel for how Beacon Hills had changed. The ley lines were the same, some of them a little stronger, a little wider. He guessed they’d had an earthquake or some other disturbance recently. He bought pizza from Palermo’s for lunch, having almost forgotten the signature taste of the marinara from the small shop before heading into the forest. It was all nostalgia and misty memories across his taste buds. When he arrived at the tree line, he took off his shoes and stepped into the forest. The ley lines surged and echoed, ricocheting an imprint of him through the forest, announcing him to the supernatural and bringing greetings and acknowledgement crashing back to him. When the ebb and flow of energy eased to a quiet comfort, he walked across the grass and into the thickness of the woods, following its guidance. It was drawing him somewhere, he knew where. The only place he hadn’t been to since he’d been back and maybe the most important one.

He stopped walking turning his head at the slight sound of feet on dry leaves. They weren’t his own and they were too far, too light, too loud to be Scott’s. The energies beneath his feet did not recognize or greet, just hovered around the source and kept him aware of their distance. Someone was following him. He turned slowly to see the glimmer of a figure, it was a fairly weak enchantment, but rather than break it he frowned and shrugged, continuing on a different path. He’d walked across whole continents, he bet the person following him didn’t have the same experience. So he continued, circling the place he was meant to go, criss crossing through the forest until he heard heavy breathing and he turned around, chasing bunnies and talking to deer occasionally. The forestry around Beacon Hills’s capital settlement was dense and filled with life for the most part outside of the mile radius of the place where he’d left himself three years ago. He chased a deer towards a small brook hearing the sound of footsteps chasing him and maybe the really silly and campy side of him wanted to sing “Colors of the Wind”, but he refrained, enjoying the feeling of the free and roaming magic of the forest. Especially the river that rushed across rocks and up, picked up by the air to splash him.

He laughed; the water nymphs and spirits apparently remembered him and didn’t fear him. He greeted them kindly and stayed for a moment to listen to the river’s song before climbing up the rocky face of the waterfall that led to high ground towards the preserve where the Hale House had been.

When he heard a desperate gasp for breath, he took a seat on a lightning struck tree and waited for the invisible form to crawl up the rock after him with a smile.

“I can keep this up all day,” he said with a smile. “And I will.”

The enchantment shattered, the caster officially exhausted and she looked at him. Dark blonde hair and dark brown eyes that looked as though she’d run a marathon. Her hair wet from the water nymph’s mischief, tied up like a druid in training and he smiled. This had to be the emissary Scott had been telling him about. This had to be _Aurora._ If she was following him around, she was definitely up to the Council’s agenda.

“Hi,” he said brightly as she heaved herself over the edge and sat on the ground huffing. “Who are you and why are you following me?”

She stood up, wheezing slightly and tilted her head, “I just wanted to get a good look at you.”

Stiles snorted, “Now, now, no need to lie.”

“You’re the infamous Stiles Stilinski, aren’t you?”

“That I am, you must be the Emissary Scott told me so much about.”

“It’s Aurora,” she said as she tilted her head up a bit: arrogant and stupid. She was definitely still in training.

Which meant the Council had sent her for some other reason than to be an emissary… probably hoping to get Derek killed when she offended the wrong person, or that she would cause him so much grief that he would be unfit to be alpha any longer. They were more than likely working towards replacing him or having him on a string. Stiles bet on replacing him… and they thought this girl was going to be able to do that, simply by bumbling around? They really did underestimate Talia’s youngest son.

“I am, I just wanted to know why they were all so interested in you,” she said. “The Council that is, you don’t look particularly special to me.”

He felt the dig and grinned, “I’m not, but you… followed me out here on an order. No words? Nothing? Or did you just like the view of my ass?”

She snorted, “The Council has named me the emissary and has warned me against the daughter of Claudia Hieronim and you as a potential threat to Beacon Hills.”

He nodded, so his mother was more crafty than he thought. He would have to tip his hat off to her. The polarizing effect of her Emissary and her motherly face had fooled the counsel…and they thought he was a girl! _Hah!_ But to what end and why? Daughter would make sense from a Wiccan standpoint. Had Claudia had a daughter, there would be no doubt in anyone’s mind that she would have been a force to be reckoned with, but if they thought that Claudia had a daughter, not a son, did that mean that they didn’t know who he was completely? Did they really only know him by an application and an incident? By his father’s line and no one else? And the two weren’t necessarily connected...They saw him as a threat? He could have snorted-- they were the threat. Being a daughter of Claudia Hieronim, however, was troubling, it meant that they were really looking for her if they sent in an undercover, albeit _stupid_ , agent...He’d have to ask his babcia what exactly did the Council have against his mother and what that would mean for him now that he was back in Beacon Hills.

“And...you’re following me… because? Didn’t you hear that I got a pass out of school?”

“I did, but you’ve also been gone for three years…And all of your records are locked. You’re suspicious, Stiles Stilinski.”

He laughed, “Me? Who’s following who around in the forest?”

She stiffened and turned to leave, “Stay away from me alright? You aren’t exactly what I envisioned when I imagined girls stalking me. They were usually hotter and prone to banging my brains out.”

She flushed and scurried away in the wrong direction, he laughed at that and waited until he was sure she was far enough away that she wouldn’t be finding him again anytime soon. There was no one else in the woods…

Energy shifted, the forest tracking a very fast moving object seeming to glide through and with the energies of the forest. He could almost hear the howling of a wolf-- a lycan. _Derek_ , he was sure and stood. He walked towards the path Derek was taking and did his best to very slowly enter into the man’s field of sense. There was no need to startle him, no need to alarm him, no need to make him think that Stiles had been able to sense him from so far away.

That would raise questions.

Derek stopped, catching the warm subtle scent and turned his head to see Stiles walking, apparently not realizing that Derek was there, or that anyone was near enough to kill him.

“Hey,” he called out and Stiles turned to look at him and then came towards him. His eyes flickered over Derek’s state of half dress and he waited. His heart rate spiked: fear, amazement, and something else that Derek would say was arousal, or maybe wonder. It was hard to tell, Stiles’s scent was confusing, intoxicating, familiar in a haunting way. It made it hard to read his emotions at all.

“What are you doing in the woods by yourself?”

“A walk,” he said with a shrug. “Your Emissary was following me around. Any chance you can get her to stop that? Also… I’m pretty sure she’s going to get herself lost in the woods.”

He sighed and nodded, “Have you done something suspicious?”

He shrugged again, “Pulled a few pranks. That’s about all.”

Derek sighed and nodded, “I’ll talk to her. Try not to wander in the woods too often, with the holes in the barrier there’s a lot of things coming out of the Hostiles.”

Stiles nodded and broached the topic against his better emotional judgement, “How bad has it gotten?”

Derek shook his head, “It’s hard to say really. Beacon Hills has always been a place that attracts trouble. There haven’t been any holes big enough for a whole person, but spirits and others like them make it through. Some have even begun to feed off the energy of the barrier itself, so that’s a whole extra issue.”

Stiles swallowed; that should have been impossible unless the barrier’s coating was thinning. That was bad… definitely bad. If it got weaker, thinner, and thinner, more things would be able to feed off the energy and enter Beacon Hills. The bigger and more numerous the holes...the more things from the hostiles that would be allowed into Beacon Hills. He knew first-hand what lay beyond the territories, the untamed wilderness they knew as the Hostiles. The terror that could descend at one human sized hole in the barrier. Beacon Hills had such a dense magical population that it wouldn’t be just a problem, it would be catastrophic.

“Don’t be afraid,” Derek said, smelling the rising anxiety, hearing his heart quickening. He could practically hear the apocalypse that Stiles’s mind was conjuring. “I’m working to get a Witch or two to come help us.”

He nodded shakily, “No need to worry then…”

Despite his tone, there was something in Stiles’s movements that betrayed that he knew something that Derek did not… Or maybe it was just the way he was? Derek couldn’t tell; he was at once so open and so guarded, moving apparently fidgeting, but closed off and so _still_. It was almost unnerving.

But there was something that Stiles knew that Derek would find out soon enough: there was no Witch or Wizard that could do what needed to be done in the territories or outside the territories.

Stiles had had a lot of time to study the barrier while he was healing and preparing to leave for Poland… The aftermath of the incident gave him a lot of time to leave the house and wander the woods. To take note of the barrier and let it take note of him. It had been a way to grieve for his mother, for the people lost, and he grieved a lot for everyone except himself.

From what he learned through his observations, the Beacon Hills barrier was an infinitely thick and compressed layer of magic with the vast ness of a universe but compressed to a thickness thinner than an atom. Passing through it was tantamount to passing through a magic circle. It would take at least four Wizards to close one penny sized hole, a whole school to close something as big as a baseball… A Paladin could hope to do it with enough planning and preparation, enough study and enough time, but, due to Fate’s sadistic sense of humor, there were no Paladins left in this world. His mother had been the last one.

And to make matters worse, the way to become a Paladin had been lost since the time of Merlin, the first Paladin class wiccan in history. The process had faded into myth. Most Wiccans believed that you were born a Paladin like Merlin, not made into one. Some believed that Merlin’s book of wisdom, Solomon’s book of knowledge, would have the answers, but no one knew where those relics were, and if they did, they weren’t able to read them.  His Babcia had only smiled when he’d asked about it all and told him that it isn’t something that could be explained so easily. Like golden dragons, they were a mystery unto themselves. She of course said it with that teasing, knowing smile, that meant she knew exactly what he wanted to know, but couldn’t or wouldn’t tell him. She was just lucky that he’d found a really interesting book in the Hieronim library that seemed more interesting than plying his babcia for information.

But ultimately, what made the Beacon Hills barrier a special and infinitely complex spell was that it was a sentient shield of pure energy. Most barriers close to its strength class either purely defended or purely marked, but the Beacon Hills barrier sensed, warned, defended absolutely, and marked across water and land without fail. It had required an insane amount of power to create and sustain. It would take potentially the same to repair it if it was deteriorating so quickly. And the fact that it was deteriorating at all as opposed to just cracking meant that the anchors of the barrier, the things that made it a barrier in the first place, were being tainted in some way. Stiles knew that was partially the land, the main anchor point of Talia, and Claudia’s gravesites. Of course, no one knew where the actual gravesites were and it had only started--

 _From within,_ he swallowed, feeling his stomach flip. It had started three years ago… Three years ago when he’d died. That’s what Scott had said, that it had started around the time he went missing. That it had grown worse since then, that it had grown and grown since he’d left for Poland.

 _It was all his fault…_ He’d tainted the barrier…

He shook his head, the ritual, the blood, the gate--

“What is it?” Derek asked regarding him, his nostrils flaring. Apprehension, worry, fear, guilt… “What is it that you know, Stiles?”

In a second, the scent shifted to carefree, the familiar sweetness of a pixie. Stiles grinned and laughed, “I know nothing. If the Alpha thinks it’s going to work, then I, a humble, lowly resident Wiccan, will bow to your wisdom.”

Stiles made a deep bow and bid him goodbye. A part of him, maybe the wolf wanted to call him back, to order the truth from him, but Derek didn’t. He had no right to do so even if Stiles was in his territory. He would never abuse his Alpha status that way. After all, his minor panic attack may have been symptomatic of something else. His scent couldn’t lie and he didn’t know of anyone that could manipulate their scents to mask their emotions...except maybe dragons and Derek doubted that Stiles was a were dragon.

More than that, Talia had always told him that earned trust was stronger than the full moon and all the cosmos, but trust that was forced was as flimsy as twigs and as immaterial as a summer breeze. He smiled wryly, she always had those sayings for him when he was growing up. To think that Laura had been the one she’d chosen all along, yet he couldn’t remember a time that Talia ever said any of those things to her. But what did he know about what they talked about on their girls day out?

 _Boys of course,_ Laura would have teased. _Wanna come?_

He missed them both dearly...wishing more than anything that either of them could give him advice, but they weren’t here and it would do anyone any good to mourn them excessively. So, he continued on his jog and kept in mind to ask Lenara about the barrier’s attributes. He didn’t understand much of it, but as a Druid she probably understood it far more. There was something niggling him at the back of his mind about Stiles’s reaction to the news about the barrier…Then again, something about Stiles in general was niggling him to no end.

*

When he was sure that Derek was gone, Stiles turned to follow the path the forest was guiding him down. Towards that place he hadn’t been to in three years, that place that held all the answers that he needed and feared. He felt it, the raw pulsing darkness in the way the energies eddied and swirled, changing direction to circle and contain it.

The clearing was larger than he remembered, cleared out by the darkness. All things had shriveled and died slowly around the tree that was the center of the clearing. The grass went brown to black, to ash and dry, rough dirt that would support no life as he drew closer.

Nothing lived in the mile radius around it. It had grown to the size of a crater...It was all his fault. His body shivered as he approached it, begging him to turn back, but he couldn’t.  It wasn't the Nemeton, but a midway point, a tree just as old as the Nemeton, with just as much potential. He knew the Druids that had established the actual Beacon Hills Nemeton had chosen the other so that they would have a greater area of protection--essentially more time to run in case of invasion. Stiles had chosen this tree because it was the perfect place for a blood ritual that wouldn’t have, _shouldn’t_ have, disrupted the barrier. The place where he died and would have to again...because...

Because, he’d been wrong in every way and now, he had to fix it. If his own need to address the issue wasn’t enough, then feeling the weight of the safety of Beacon Hills pressing on his throat because of his last ditch effort to exorcise a thousand year old demon with no help was more than enough make the trek across the barren ground towards that tree that was haunted and twisted with death worthwhile.

He had to.

As he stepped further into the clearing, the wholesome energies of the forest vanished, replaced by swirling chaos, pain and ghosts of memories beneath his feet, whispering in the air like phantoms. They pricked his bare feet, sensing him, greeting him, slipping into him and making his core go cold. They beat against his chest pushing him out and away, pulling him in and attempting to crush him.

He hadn’t forgotten the pain and fear, the desperation, but he liked not to think about it. Standing here now meant that he had to not only think about it, remember it, but experience it all again up until the last moment… and, if he was unsuccessful, be trapped in it for all eternity. Taming a death spot was emotionally strenuous, taming his own death spot would probably be worse than any other he'd tamed. Did he really want to do that? Of course not, but who knew how much stress this place was putting on the barrier?

He knew.

He shook his head. In the center, the tree stood. It had been split by lightning that night, clear in half. It was blackened all the way to the end of the branches and pulsed with his life and turmoil. The last moment of him, bleeding into the bark, his blood soaking into it, turning it black and sealing his fate there forever...At least that’s what he’d thought until he’d woken up as half Stiles and half something else. The leaves were black and it still bore the bloodstains of that night, neat blood red kanji on either half. The sacrifice had been absolute, everything he’d been was there and he could feel it reaching out and pushing him away all at the same time. Sorrow and shame...Darkening this tree with the evil of the purge and the magic he’d held then.

Seeing it, he was amazed that he’d been powerful enough to be bound to a Life Cast, he supposed that the magic he'd been taking in from the Nogitsune crossed the threshold. He hadn’t known then, but he'd been prepared for it. Looking at the ley lines around it, the brightness before and the dimness after, the darkness of the land. He knew clearly how much stress it was placing on the barrier as it was the crossroads of multiple ley lines. The land surrounding its influence grew greener the farther away it was from the center.

Spirits of the air surrounded the perimeter of its influence, water and earth trembling and standing to bear witness as they had then. It had been them that had kept the barrier in the shape it was in, rerouted telluric energies to the Nemeton so the barrier would keep. It had been them that had led him here in the first place. He wondered if they’d known that it wouldn’t work as he thought it would. If his mother had made a deal with the gods to send him back… If she had befriended the spirits to protect him as he fought a battle that the Council had no interest in, but could have been disastrous to everyone had he not won.

Had he won? The last three years hadn’t felt like a victory.

Stiles took a deep breath, he had to do this right, so he opened his eyes and watched the ghost of himself run into the clearing, barefoot, singed in places, cut bruised, bleeding, deteriorating from the inside, pacing around the tree, arguing with nothing--the Nogitsune--as it tore him apart from within. Thick gobs of blood and flies in his mouth. It tasted like black licorice and tar, he remembered. He’d crumbled at that roar against the tree and screamed, choking on it, spitting it out. Covering his ears and struggling through the pain, the already broken mess that he’d become. His eyes were dark and Stiles watched himself crawl towards the tree that had been there once, old, whole and prepared for what he had planned. Lightning had twisted through the sky. Rain had come and made the crawl slick and hard on his already exhausted body, but he’d made it. His own blood, the tar and licorice mess, slicking the way, blood on his hands.

Blood on his hands that wasn’t his…

Blood on his hands--

One hand, then the other, pulling him to stand, until he was standing against the tree, tears streaming from the pain. He'd flipped his body so his back was on the tree.

And now, this Stiles, the one of now, takes a breath and walks towards the broken tree, to the place where his ghost stands trembling wishing there is another way and knowing there isn't. He ducks under one half of it and hears the thunder and lightning of that night as he rounds the tree to where he prays for the strength to go through with this. He’s bleeding and those few drops are already starting the ceremony, speeding it to the place of no return. His mouth tastes like tar and licorice. And Stiles hears the words of the Nogitsune, dark whispers at the back of his mind.

_You liked it Stiles, being so important._

Stiles steps into the grooves there from blood and his feet and follows that old movement to step across the root and slide his back against the tree until he faces the direction of the Nemeton and stands in the last place he’d stood in this world. He turns to face the Nemeton in the distance, feeling the weak thrumming of the ley lines beneath his bare feet, they had been stronger then. His hands tremble and he raises his hands, following his ghost and his memories to raise the phantom dagger into the air.

 _You must confront the moment, you must regain your control. It is your pain, harness and accept it. Mourn and grieve for what you lost and understand what you have become. In doing so, save yourself as you had to do then,_ Chief Kai'na said when she told him that it was the only way to begin to live his life again.

This was his only option.

His ley lines trembled as his ghost melds with his physical form. It starts as terror and trembling, desperation and the ticking clock. The struggles to lift his arms even as his blood comes out in thick fly-ridden rivulets down his chin. It _hurts_ soul and bone deep, the way his insides are being devoured by dark magic, demon magic. His arms lock against the move, the Nogitsune is there. The past revived, he closes his eyes, sinking into the moment, deeper and deeper until he is here in the woods again, lightning and rain in the sky, the ground alive beneath him the entirety of the universe watching him. Spirits and ghosts watching and the whole of Beacon Hills none the wiser except Scott and Kira.

For them, his father and the people of Beacon Hills… for his mother—

 _For the people that hated him and sneered?_ The Nogitsune sneers. _For the ones who deserve to be crushed, Stiles? You fight this?_

The knife he’d picked up from the police department in his hands is hard to hold onto since he’d burned his hands in the explosion, but he grips it against the burn and breathes deep shuddering breaths.

The Nemeton calls to him and the Nogitsune lifts its nose towards the scent of the tree. It is not the Nemeton, but it is near, if only the body would move towards it. _Weak_ mortal bodies, it bemoans. The Nemeton, the pure blood-ridden chaos and power of the Nemeton--it craves.

Stiles craves.

 _Take it in, taint it, open it to the other world_ , it teases, whispers.

 _Open the gates of hell and unleash the end of the world,_ Stiles craves, his mouth watering more and the taste of tar grows sweeter.

 _Taint the barrier from within and let the Hostiles flow in,_ it says. So much power, so much pain, only a little farther, it knows. And it will be there. It will dump Stiles’s body, a perfect offering, to the storm and thrive in the infinite chaos that he will wreak. Stiles’s spirit condemned to hell, his name condemned as the worst of criminals and his whole world destroyed if he moves a single inch.

 _Where is it?!_ The heart of the Beacon Hills Barrier.

 _Where is it, Stiles?_ The voice that snarls in his ears, the gaunt imitation of his face that roars, the bandaged face and greasy maw that screams at him in his nightmares and waking dreams.

Then and now--here and now--now, now, _now_ \--his last line of defense, the monster is banging on the door of his inner memories of studying the barrier to find where she died, his bloodline, his mother. He has to protect her, he has to, he will. He doesn’t have a choice. There is no time with each claw, each bang it gets closer and closer. Stiles isn’t sure if he can hold out another minute, let alone another year. He can’t wait for it to drain him to death, he has to take the leap and he has to take it now.

No second chances at apocalypse.

No second thoughts of the end.

He breathes and before him he sees his own gaunt face, the way he looks now, the way the Nogitsune appears to him as it curses and yells within him, tearing at the walls until it finds itself within the Nemeton, inside Stiles’s psychic prison…

_A sick, twisted imitation—_

A fox tricked by a kid…

He raises the knife, prepared to rip through himself and trembles, so damned scared. Scott and his father, Kira… his mother….

 _Forgive me, Mom..._ he thinks at the first tear of the past on his cheek, the last of the present, slipping through his fingertips, out of his veins in screaming black rivulets of magic and flies that takes like tar and licorice.

It’s thick, slick, and gory over his taste buds and he screams.

That Stiles with the gaunt eyes laughs at this one and crosses his arms. A sassy, twisted version of himself, but worse than then, worse than now. This isn’t a replay but a new experience.  A melding of his past and present to reach forward and stop himself, to test himself, to stop what it could not stop then. The sand in the middle of the hourglass, shifting back and forth and pinned in the narrow space of now. It may have actually closed the portal forever and then where would it be? Foxes are tricksters… they trick everyone and always have to have the last laugh. This will be the final exorcism he is sure, the last redemption.

If he fucks this up, he’ll lose everything for real.

There will not be another three years to try again.

No last redemption.

“You think this will help you? _I know what you fear Stiles, I know what you are_ at the very core. A spineless coward, a weakling-- a disappointment to everyone around you.”

He swallows and takes a deep breath seeing through the rain of the night as the Nogitsune tears through his mind to find secrets that he will never get. Seeing through the clear day of the present; he sees that same face as then. Memory and now, insecurity and knowledge meld together and solidify as it had been then, as it is now. Sassy, degrading, _angry_ … afraid.

Who is more afraid? It or Stiles?

Stiles has everything to lose, everything to protect, everything to gain by doing this now. An end and absolution, a freedom beyond flesh.

The Nogitsune has only everything to lose.

“ _You will never be free of me, but dip your toes into my world and be dragged to its depths.  I will revert you Stiles and you will take me to the Nemeton and I’ll get to the center of the Beacon Barrier… because you enjoyed tearing it all to pieces..._ ”

The Stiles before him steps forward to take the knife and hold it in the air, keeping Stiles from plunging it into his chest as he has to now. He is strong, strong enough to hold Stiles’ hands still, but not strong enough to take it from him.

“ _You revelled in the chaos and power_.”

Stiles tugs against the hold and feels the other’s power slipping.

 _“Remember how important you felt… how powerful… how_ amazing _it was to have their lives dangling in your hands and they knew it? You don’t want to kill me Stiles.”_

Stiles tugs again, a little closer and the other’s expression changes just as it changes in his mind's eye now. _Angry_.

“ _I made you visible when even your own parents hid you away like some curse.”_

Stiles tugs again, a little close and the other’s expression changes just as it changes in his mind’s eye now. _Rage._

“ _I am a thousand years old Stiles and more powerful than you could ever hope to be, even if you were a daughter of Hieronim! You cannot kill me.”_

Stiles pulls again. _Desperation._

“ _You cannot kill me!”_

Stiles hears himself screaming and plunges his curled fists towards his chest. The rip of the knife through his chest cavity, through his stomach—the scream. Again, again, and the swirl of magic fills his head with memories and the agony. His legs tremble as they ricochet through his mind .

_You cannot kill me Stiles!_

_Stiles… Stiles… poor stupid pathetic Stiles…_

_No one’s here to help you Stiles_

_No one cares that you’re dying Stiles_

_No one cares…_

_No one._

_I gave you power!_

_Wake up!_

_I gave your pathetic life meaning!_

_Wake Up!_

_I gave you purpose!_

_Wake Up!_

His voice screaming out into silence all awash with darkness and sorrow and he breathes. Trembling, one more, there isn’t enough blood yet, he has to. He is strong enough, one more. He draws the knife out as the spirit roars through his psyche and tears through his doors.

_You will never be strong enough!_

He opens his eyes to see the face of that empty shell of himself and grins around the bitter taste of tar and too sweet licorice, “ _Fuck you._ ”

The power of the ley lines surge through him again and Stiles draws the knife back into himself and drags it down so his entrails fall forward. Blood and his life fall to the ground and his strength fails --he falls back as lightning strikes down to split the tree in half. It cradles him, burns his back, drinks his blood even as he gasps through the thickness in his lungs. Hands rise and trace blood red characters into the left and right side. On the right side, the kanji for self and gate. On the left, the characters for chaos, voice, wild, and fox.

 _“I write your name,”_ he breathes, choking as the world grows dark and cold around him. He’s alone now. He can hurt no one. He’ll make sure of that. _And cast you into the chaos and void with the blood of my ancestors.”_

_You cannot kill me, Stiles… you will bleed out before you do._

He feels the tendrils of power and panic. The Nogitsune is afraid? Big powerful thousand year old demonic spirit… afraid of little old Stiles’ magic words. The fucker should have done his homework and if he thinks that Stiles is going to bleed out first, they’ll both be damned.

 _“I change this form,”_ he wheezes. “ _And cast you out of the pain you have caused.”_

_You think you have power enough to vanquish me, child?! You have no power at all!_

“ _I give my life and all of the everlasting and mark you: damned until the gates of hell open, until the wall of heaven falls, until the world’s end.”_

“ _NO!”_ It roars fighting the pull of the vanquishing.

He feels the tug of the Nogitsune attempting to free itself and the beginning of the blood spell forming a net to keep him still. Stiles pours the last of his magic into it and more. Catching the Nogitsune in a choke hold of magic and the last of his will as the stability of his mind crumbles and he backs them up towards the portal to hell opening in his mind, his body, the forest. The ley lines bend to open it wider. And it’s all chaos and madness, just a crazy story screaming _I’m taking you with me._

“ _I write myself as a gate and become the guardian of your portal. To stand watch and thwart you at every turn until the sky has fallen.”_

_This is not the end child! I am a thousand years old. I have survived countless exorcisms! Countless wars! Countless summons and trappings!_

_“At the end of days, you will be trapped behind with me as your gate keeper.”_

_“You will not succeed where others, more powerful, have failed!”_

_“With my blood I cast you out-- may all your days of chaos be repaid in peace.”_

_“You will die as you live: pointless, useless, waste of --”_

“ _With my life, I cast you out._ ”

The last verse is little more than a breath, as the energies that have kept him alive for so long surge and cast them both back and down through the portal. The knife slips from his hand and he hears the Nogitsune screaming. Everything goes in flashes of light and the roar of the wind. He sees the legions of demons waiting to catch his soul as the Nogitsune plummets to the bottom circle of hell.

The brightness of the world above vanishes. His Wiccan soul, imprints and grows into the tree, marring it black, as he falls and everything goes black. For just a moment, he thinks he can hear his mother's voice. Telling him that everything's okay. That the monsters won't hurt him, that he's done good...

That she's proud of him. Proud of him, her son... Her one and only son.

He wonders if that's because she's watching over him or if it's the last of his mind breaking into chaos shards.


	4. 'Cause You're My Bro

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Everyone loves a pixie.

Scott heard Lydia's Banshee scream and ran towards the sound only to run into Stiles’s comatose body in a lightning cracked tree. The ground around it growing greener, shaking off the decay of years that even his pixie presence didn’t seem to help. Usually, a desolate place like that would have sprouted flowers or at least grass as soon as he was near, but he’d walked into a dead zone that had begun to flourish through powers that were not his own.

The tree seemed to be coming back to life as the blackness receded from the tips of the leaves to where Stiles lay unmoving, unbreathing. His face pale, his mouth open, and his eyes staring out into nothing. Scott rushed towards him just as color filled the limbs of the tree and the leaves blossomed. How odd that they were blood red magnolias. He was sure that those didn’t exist in California he was pretty sure those didn't exist at all. As the last of the blackness vanished, and the bloodstains vanished, color bloomed across Stiles’s face. He seemed encased in light. Scott swallowed and watched the shifting of magic across his skin and the first breath he took sounded like a gasp of life. His eyes flickered open and Scott waited. What kind of crazy shit was Stiles doing out in the woods?

“Stiles?” He whispered, “Stiles are you okay?”

Stiles wasn’t sure what that meant, but he nodded and as he began to settle back into his own form, he felt his old ley lines shimmering into solidarity, settling and felt another set overlaying them and harmonizing with the ley line he lay on feeding power, his power, into the slowly forming ley lines. He remembered why he chose the place, the old story of the creation of the Nemeton, an ultimate blood sacrifice and wish, a desperate tangle between balance and chaos all focused on a ley line. He'd been smart.

“Stiles?”

He didn’t respond but shifted a bit, his eyes still glowing from whatever had happened float over to Scott and for a moment Scott was in the past- three years ago exactly.

That burst of light that had soared up and the scream that had come with it. He remembered running to the spot, praying, hoping that he wouldn’t be too late to save Stiles only to find him lying, in a puddle of blood on the actual Nemeton, devoid of the ghastly haunted look that had been around him for months. For once in a long time, Stiles had looked at him and really seen him as Scott leaned him against his chest and lifted him. When had Stiles gotten so light?

“ _Scott… bro… sorry...about… the sword…_ ”

“Stiles?”

Stiles sat up all of a sudden, looking at his hands in wonder, touching the solid, rich brown bark of the tree he was lying in. It was no longer split by lightning, but an oak whose branches had split at the base and formed a seat. The blood words vanished into the growing bark as Lydia broke through the tree line to see them and pointed at Stiles.

“What are you doing?”

Stiles snorted, leaning back and tilted his head, “A guy can’t fall asleep in the forest?”

“On a Death Spot? Are you that magically inept?”

“Lydia,” Scott started.

Stiles shrugged, bouncing a little in the cozy hollow in the tree. A grin broke across his face and Scott wasn’t sure what to make of it.

“Feels alright to me.”

Lydia shook her head, promising to tell Derek about this before leaving Scott and Stiles alone. Scott was at his side almost instantly. At first touch, he felt a ripple of magic that felt oddly like Stiles. The spirits of the woods began to spread towards them, signaling animals and other creatures to return to inhabiting the place. With every passing moment, the land leading towards the Nemeton grew greener. Scott could practically feel the forest relaxing in a way that it hadn’t in a long time…

Three years to be exact.

“What happened? What are you doing out here? Have you been communing with the spirits of the earth without me again? You know how much I want to meet an earth spirit.”

Stiles smiled, “No, I haven’t...This… is where I died Scott.”

Scott blinked and shook his head, “What does that mean?”

He smiled, “I came here… that night. To make a new Nemeton and vanquish the Nogitsune.”

“Uh… that’s… bad? Good? What do you mean that you died? This isn’t where I found you...”

Stiles shook his head, Scott had been the worst at spirit rules when they were in school. A pixie he may be, in tuned with the forest and earth he was, but spirits… he might as well have been human.  Spirits that work on possession require a stable host to hold their power. If you change the host, you throw it out and it's vulnerable…As a Wiccan, he was resistant to werewolf bites and other things that would have turned a human. There were only two ways to change a wiccan: kill them or make them human. Making a Wiccan human is a long and arduously painful process and illegal as the magic from even a low level Wiccan that would be freed from a controlling body would be the equivalent to an armed, set, and detonated nuclear bomb. Yep, much easier to kill a Wiccan in most cases. In the case of possessions, it is the killing of a Wiccan’s ley lines in the body that is the most important. Chopping off the head of a wiccan that was possessed would just result in a headless body that was possessed by an evil spirit and no consciousness to fight it. Bad idea.

“I had to purify and end my ley lines, the only way to do that would be to create a Death Spot…”

“Okay… I’m sort of following… what does this have to do with the Nemeton and this tree?”

Places like the Nemeton were built on blood sacrifices. It wouldn’t have been good enough to just get it out of Stiles, he had to get it out of this plane all together… Stiles had to leave this plane altogether as well… at least his consciousness, his ley lines, had to. He’d had to if it was the last thing he did. He’d bled out in this tree, he knew that. He’d died and in his death had opened a one way portal from the physical plane to hell and forced the Nogitsune and himself to go tumbling through it. He’d done it on a ley line, a direct opening to the other worlds that existed so there was no chance it would come back. A Death Spot, as it was known, was a permanently closed point between this world and the next. They were caused by violent or ritual deaths and meant to keep Wiccan spirits from coming back as dark spirits… He'd  been prepared to be trapped there forever, standing guard over his portal, the only portal that the Nogitsune could use to reenter the world as he was tied to Stiles’ life force in the end, if it meant saving the only family he had left.

“I died… and somehow… I came back… I guess my idea to change the host went over a little differently than I thought… Magic is strange that way...I never told Dad… but that’s why I had to leave.”

“So… you’re a zombie?”

He snorted, “No. I’m still a Wiccan, but I didn’t come back with the same ley lines… I came back with the ley lines of a spirit, the Nogitsune to be specific.”

Scott’s jaw dropped as Stiles laughed, “I’m not possessed anymore Scott… binding the Nogitsune’s ley lines to myself brought me back in a sense and doubled to keep the Nogitsune from ever entering into the world again… Of course, that means coming back with an even more advanced form of MDI… and now that I’ve regained my ley lines… and maintained those of the Nogitsune… it’s like my mind is on magic hyper drive all the time.”

Scott nodded, “Yeah… I did tell you I barely passed that class right? MDI that's the magic interference thing right?”

“Magical Dispersion Interference,” He grinned, “I know, but you passed. And yes, that’s it.”

“Okay… but you’re okay now?”

He nodded with a grin, “I feel… whole.”

Scott nodded and helped him get up. Stiles swooned on his feet and giggled a little bit, the heady rush of pixie dust in his ley lines. Apparently, he’d have to go back to being careful about touching people…or maybe he was still settling? He'd ask Lenara when he got a chance, maybe acquire another seal or two while he was at it just to be on the safe side. Not that he didn’t harmonize to a degree with people around him even before the Nogitsune, but it was much more acute and felt more like he was generating different kinds of magic as well as absorbing it. His hand sparkled from where Scott had held it and the lightest dust of pixie dust was there on his fingertips. He waved it away and watched the grass beneath him grow a little greener.

Okay, that was definitely new...

“What’s so funny?”

“How do you feel so bubbly all the time?”

Scott laughed, “I’m a pixie… It’s kind of our thing.”

He nodded and followed Scott help him out of the woods and towards a car that looked suspiciously like Jackson’s car as he felt the rush of pixie dust subside and he felt a little more Wiccan. Pixies were apparently high speed mentally in a very different way than Wiccans.

“That’s Jackson’s car isn’t it?”

“Yes, but we’re getting into my car.”

He laughed and got into the second car, an old Toyota. It had been Melissa’s, but Stiles guessed that she’d given it to him when she’d gotten a new car.

“Your mom driving a Benz now?”

He laughed, “Close, a BMW.”

“Ooh, classy.”

Stiles got into the car and buckled up as Scott regarded Lydia and Jackson a little farther up the section of road.

“There’s going to be a pack meeting tonight, don’t be late.”

“Usual time?”

“Yeah.”

Stiles was impressed, it was almost a cordial exchange, except Jackson who glared at him and Lydia who cast suspicious looks his way. At some point in his life, he would have leaped for joy that she was even looking at him but right now, he just felt like sticking out his tongue. Scott pulled away from the curb and drove him home saying that he’d bring Kira with him when he came back that night.

Derek groaned at the text: _Emergency pack meeting, please?_

What could possibly have gone wrong? He was already stressed about the upcoming event. And the slew of meetings and negotiations looming in their future.  What else could have gone wrong? Never mind that, he walked through the Hale House, reimagined and fire-retardant… it was empty except for him. But, as much as he was a social creature, living with a bunch of hormonal, sex-crazed, and dating young adults was hell on him and his lack of a sex life. Between the noises and the smells… It was too much and had ultimately led him to try to rebuild the Hale House one more time and stop camping out in the Safe Houses.

If he was honest, he would say that he would be better off in an apartment and turning the Hale House into another safe house… But with the Hale Family vault beneath the house, holding an extensive history of artifacts, that wouldn’t have been an entirely safe idea. If the Pack got bigger, he’d probably move some of them to the Hale House, or put them in rotation for when people were on duty in different cities or during rotations.. Beacon Hills would have to expand sooner or later and that would mean more patrols, more protection and more people.

He smiled a bit, passing a family portrait. He hardly recognized his face in the picture. He wasn’t any older than five in it. It had barely escaped the fire as a tiny picture in his wallet. It was the only picture left his mother that he owned. He’d been lucky that Beacon Hills had likenesses of her and Laura in the museum and the county records. It was how he always wanted to remember them: proud, strong, amazing Alphas capable of leading people to edge of darkness and having no fear that they would follow if only asked.

He shook his head, there was no time to be sentimental. He headed towards the door, feeling the door lock behind him as he climbed into the Camaro and sighed. Laura had made him hate the car when she was alive, but now that she was gone, it was the only thing he could stomach driving… He drove towards the barracks and parked. They were already arguing it sounded like and Aurora was there, so perhaps it was terribly serious if they included the druid girl… or maybe she was the one who called it in the first place. The text had come for the barrack phone so there was really no telling. Derek took a deep breath and unlocked the door to hear them fully.

“He’s suspicious! Anyone with a little magical awareness knows not to go towards a Death Spot! We have a natural aversion to it! Even vampyr don’t go near them!”

“You don’t know anything about it so just keep your mouth shut!” Scott yelled back and it was maybe the first time he’d ever seen Scott producing black pixie dust. It was only a bit, but it was enough to make everyone go quiet.

At the very least, it meant that he was serious. Black pixie dust was the more dangerous version of the normal white. Where white made thing blossom, black pixie dust was the acid of the fabric of the universe.  Black pixie magic wasn't something to be trifled and it was another reason why pixies had to stay happy… all the time.

“Everyone,” Derek started, using just a bit of his alpha powers to make them calm down. “Sit down and start from the beginning. Lydia your side goes first since I assume you called the meeting.”

Scott did as asked as did Lydia and Aurora as he came in to the room and closed the door behind him. He took his customary seat in the middle of the sofa and noticed the distinct divide in the room: Lydia, Jackson and Aurora were on the same side… How strange for anyone to be on Aurora's side, let alone Lydia. But it wasn’t as shocking as Erica being on Aurora’s side. He would have known that there was something seriously wrong with the world if that ever happened.

But all that aside, if there was anything Lydia did well, besides her nails, it was her research. She'd been the salutatorian of their class, the top spot held by someone no one knew and hadn't bothered to show up to the graduation ceremony. Then again, neither had Scott...Aurora:he couldn’t trust to call a pack meeting for something serious, but if Lydia thought it needed addressing he was sure that he should at the very least hear her out. Being a Banshee meant that Lydia was in tune with the language of the spirits, that also meant she had a bit of an emotional stake in a conversation concerning anything she brought to the table. As dispassionate as she could be in her analysis of any given situation, Derek couldn’t ignore that fact. Jackson was more or less willing to go with anything Lydia said and acted as a less than useful sounding board for her. But at least he was good at calming her down because when Lydia had a hysteric fit it was always Jackson that pulled her out of it. Fairy magic or the fact that they’d been together all throughout high school, Derek didn’t know and didn’t care.

On the other hand, Scott was emotional all the time and a little bit too optimistic, he brightened the group up considerably, but when he got emotionally involved it became a tad dangerous. Kira was his calming factor. Level headed, witty, and literally a fox, Kira was not one to get terribly emotionally involved in anything… except when it came to Scott.

At the very least, Erica, Boyd, Isaac and Allison had less emotional involvement with whatever was about to happen. Besides their dislike of Aurora, the four of them had little to do with what was about to transpire. And when Lydia began to make her case, Derek knew that they would be the deciding factor.

“Stiles Stilinski,” Lydia started. “I found him lying on a Death Spot so I went to go look him up. Guess what? His records are locked! Everything from his face, his date of birth--everything.”

Derek waited for Aurora to speak, “It’s true. All records pertaining to Stiles Stilinski are locked. I've contacted the counsel about it, but they haven't responded yet.”

“It would help to know that Stiles isn’t his first name,” Scott said. “And so what? So are my records and Kira’s.”

“Yeah, but you weren’t sitting in a Death Spot now were you?” Lydia said. “Nor are you just back from a mysterious three year absence?"

Scott growled and Kira took his hand, pulling him back down to sit as Derek looked between the three to his left.

“Lydia did you sense anyone about to die?”

“I did, that’s why I went. It felt strange, I can’t really describe it but that was definitely a Death Spot, a recent one too. There are no records of any Wiccans dying in the forest recently though.”

“How recent?” Derek asked.

“At least within the last hundred years or so.”

“Yeah,” Scott snorted. “That’s really recent.”

Lydia glared at him and Derek cut in, “What exactly is a Death Spot?”

“It’s where a high-powered Wiccan has died due to unusual circumstances, usually ritual or violent.”

Derek nodded, “And there’s no record of one happening in those woods? That doesn’t meant that there hasn’t been one.”

“Or that it’s a really old one and someone really powerful, powerful like Claudia Hieronim powerful died there back before Beacon Hills was established. There’s really no history about the territory that isn’t locked up in the old Druid works in Lenara’s house. But it’s not really important when they died, so much that the Death Spot is like a pit of power.”

“What do you mean?” Derek asked.

“High powered Wiccans that die that way leave their soul, an imprint of their magic there in that spot before passing on to the other world. It’s called a Life Cast. They leave it on this plane because taking it to the other side would make it vulnerable to a dark spirit that could absorb the power, taint their magic line and possess the entire family. It’s a really old Wiccan blood thing. Essentially, it locks their magic, basically the core of their souls to that place and purges it of all impurities…. except they’re stuck there. It’s like limbo for Wiccans in which part of them experiences their death over and over again. They’re supposed to fade with time, but this one didn’t seem to be fading or lessened in anyway, if anything it had grown.”

Scott felt his stomach turn, he had no doubt that Stiles had known all of this… That he’d planned on it…. he’d sought it out as a means to an end. His eyes burned… He’d planned on an eternity in limbo reliving his last most painful moments… where no one would ever find him or be able to lay him to rest? Better that than another moment possessed by a dark spirit? They’d never talked about what being possessed was like, they hadn’t talked about all the things that the Nogitsune had made Stiles do or say either, but to think that an eternity as an unsettled spirit, locked to one place, alone was a better alternative…

His jaw trembled and Kira gripped his hand, an anchor before he tipped into the gray pixie space. He’d almost gone there before when Stiles was mostly dead in the forest. It had been Kira and Melissa that had kept him from tipping any farther. He’d sat next to Stiles’ bed everyday after they recovered him from the forest after school and talked to the body that was barely breathing. Pixie dust for a healthy normal pixie was always white, sparkling white. Black Pixie dust was practically a very angry pixie capable of mass amounts of chaos if it got out of hand… But gray pixie space, when all the pixie dust lost its healthy glow was capable of leveling whole forests and towns with the strength of the despair and anguish and it was probably the hardest phase for any pixie to get out of and the easiest to slip into. If Stiles had truly died that night, Scott was sure that no amount of hugs or kisses or soothing words would have brought him back from that place of despair.

“How far could it grow and is it a danger to Beacon Hills?”

“Yes!” Lydia said. “If someone could harmonize with it, they could take the power, the lineage of whoever died there into themselves. And that’s why he’s suspicious. Not to mention its potential effects on the barrier.”

Derek waited, “From what I remember of Stiles he wasn’t all that great, he didn’t do much magically or whatever and he’s the Sheriff's kid so he probably doesn’t have that much magical affinity being that it's passed through gender lines--”

“You aren’t a Wiccan. You think everything can be explained by a bunch of books? You don’t know anything,” Scott said. “Stiles is hot shit and just because you were too busy playing dumb to notice how awesome he was doesn’t mean you can just--”

“Scott,” Kira soothed, taking his hand and squeezing. He glanced to where the white shimmer that was always right beneath his fingernails was growing dark again and took a breath. “It’s alright.”

“As I was saying,” Lydia went on, that prim, superior sound in his voice that _grated_ Scott’s nerves. “If there was anyone who would have a motive to visit a Death Spot and try and commune with it, it would be him. And to make matters worse, Death Spots are highly temperamental, they’ll give you power, but it also becomes a gateway to the other side and you never know what could come through if managed improperly. Stiles didn’t have anything extraordinary about his magic, probably at the same level as the Sheriff, or lower, meaning he wouldn’t be able to handle it properly.”

Derek nodded and looked towards Scott who looked about ready to jump across the room and strangle Lydia with a garland of flowers if she kept going on.

“Is there anything else this side of the room would like to add before we move to the other side?"

Aurora spoke ,"The counsel has asked that we keep an eye on him as he was apparently involved in the terrorist incident three years ago."

Scott stood a ball of glittering white and black dust in his hand sprouting angry black thorns, red vines and flowers. Kira threw a magic circle to hold him still before he could advance across the room on Aurora. His eyes flashed, glaring at Aurora, but he couldn’t move. Aurora stared almost frightened and moved closer to Derek’s side of the room. Though frozen in place, Scott’s eyes tracked her movement.

Derek groaned, if the Counsel wanted it, in his experience, it would turn out badly for everyone involved-- especially Derek. He turned to Scott who was still partially frozen by Kira’s magic circle.

"Scott, you have something to say? Kira, let him go."

Kira eased the hold as Scott began to calm. When the ball of dust fizzled into a pile of harmless flower petals at his feet, he was free to move.

“Thank you Kira,” he said and she beamed at him.

He breathed. Once upon a time, Stiles taught him how to argue his point, if only so Scott could learn to control his temper. It had been interesting and had made him a better writer… which meant he’d actually passed with a B that last semester because of a paper on the Council. He took a calm breath, held up his hand, extended three fingers and looked at Lydia first.

“One,” he put down one finger. “Lydia, you didn’t know him in high school and you don’t know him now. You have no idea what he’s like enough to call him _suspicious._ How many people have you called _suspicious_ in the middle of your hysteric fits? Not to mention, I doubt you read any _Wiccan_  or _Druid_ sources on Death Spots because they’ve all been _banned, burned or hoarded_ by the council. Lenara wouldn’t let you anywhere near her collection even if you could read it and I know she wouldn’t let Aurora read it either. So until you get some better proof about what exactly a Death Spot can do from a real Wiccan or Druid-- Shut up.”

Lydia gawked at him as he put another finger down, “Two, Kira and I have locked files for the very same reason, the so-called “terrorist” incident was the council’s fault in the first place so I _doubt_ they're the most reputable source. You can shut up too, Aurora.”

Aurora’s face went red and she opened her mouth to say something as he put down the final finger, leveling all three of them with a stare.

“Three, I’ve known Stiles my whole life. If there is anyone who loves Beacon Hills more, it would be Derek. He wouldn’t do anything to destroy this place. He’s not nefarious. He’s not suspicious. He’s not evil. And he sure as hell isn’t a threat. If he was, he would have blasted your ass the moment you started following him and done us all a favor.”

Everyone looked at Aurora then who remained quiet and lifted her head, “It was an order from the council.”

Scott snorted.

Kira chimed in, "I didn't know Stiles long before he left, but he was anything but evil."

If anything, with what she knew now, he was brave beyond his years and so damned loyal. And too damn smart for Lydia to call him below ordinary. Derek nodded. Hearing Scott lay down his points so eloquently was almost a shock. When the hell could he do that? Usually he was a jumbled mess of really quickly spoken words.

"And now for our emotionally uninvolved parties?"

Erica hummed, Isaac and Allison traded glances before Boyd spoke up.

"We've interviewed a bunch of people in town including Lenara and members of the interim Beacon pack when Lydia brought it up to us. No one had much to say about Stiles beyond the fact that he was a mischievous troublemaking kid that hung around with Scott. Lenara didn’t say much about Stiles’ heritage, but the others, save the Sheriff, all assumed he was at least half pixie, if not adopted by the Sheriff and his wife.”

“Lenara told us that death spots are actually dangerous if they are left uncleansed and unbound, especially if they are near ley lines. It doesn't take a lot of power to do it, just a willingness to pay homage and know the Wiccan's pain and remember them. There isn't anything nefarious about the procedure. He probably did us a favor considering the state of the barrier… at least that’s what Lenara had to say. She also said that they were less a pit of power and more like a gateway made up of a wiccan’s spirit. While they suffer, they also guard the portal they’ve created from anything that might try and come through… or come back through in the case of an exorcism."

Scott felt his heart tremble and he smiled a bit. Kira squeezed his hand, feeling the softness of flower petals appearing in his palm. No doubt hearing someone back up his knowledge of Stiles with a reputable source of information had warmed him considerably.

"And what is the state of the barrier?"

"It's deteriorating fast, exponentially according to Lenara... She thinks that maybe the anchor points are being tampered with, but she’ll check to make sure. There may not be enough time to call or negotiate for help. And it wouldn't sustain a thing like an untamed death Spot from within, especially not one so near to the Nemeton."

Scott grinned a little, he was sure that Stiles had known that too the moment he’d woken up or at least the moment he’d come back. Who knew how far Stiles had planned? Either way, he had no doubts that Stiles had come back because of it, to fix it. Stiles was always that way.

“And now that it’s been taken care of, presumably?” Derek asked.

“She says, depending on where it was, it probably freed up a ley line to charge up the Nemeton, may have bought us some time. But she’s going to check and make sure.”

Derek nodded and looked at Lydia who looked speechless, “And this Death Spot, was it on a ley line? Anywhere near the Nemeton?”

“Uhm… I think so...It was between the Nemeton and the center of town.”

There was a whole forest between the Nemeton and the center of town… that didn’t mean that it was necessarily on a ley line.

“And is it gone?”

She made a face, “I’m not sure.”

“Do you feel the pull of it, Lydia?” Derek asked almost humorously.

“No.”

“We’ll get Lenara to check it out to be certain, but it seems that someone, Stiles or not, has done us all a favor.”

“But how would he even know that it was there?” Lydia piped up. “It’s not like he’s a banshee.”

Erica growled, “Surprisingly, he’s at least half-Wiccan and Wiccans have their own ways of reaching out to their own beyond this world. If he was related to the person, the pull would be strong. Banshees aren’t the only ones that can connect with the dead.”

Lydia wrinkled her nose and Derek shook his head. Lydia was wrong, but somehow he knew that would be the case. He’d met the kid and there didn’t seem to be anything nefarious about him, not even the distinct lack of the magical field that most Wiccan’s produced. Nikodem didn’t have one after all.

“A compromise,” Derek said. “If Lenara checks it out and says all is clear, we focus on the upcoming negotiations for aid instead of chasing around Scott’s best friend from high school? If not, then we keep an eye on him, but no one is to do anything until Lenara has given her verdict, alright?”

Lydia huffed and nodded. Scott only grinned, a glimmer of white pixie dust back on his skin. Derek breathed a low hiss of relief. The last thing they needed was any more division in the pack. Aurora looked put out about it.

“What about when the counsel has words about him?”

“Direct them to me,” Derek said, easily. “I doubt that they will have much to say about it at all. They aren’t exactly forthcoming with any information ever now are they?”

Aurora said nothing and then Derek was up, “If that is all, I have a very large event to plan for, as do you Aurora. Here’s the list.”

He handed over the scroll, which she took cautiously. Fear, apprehension, bravado… Derek almost cursed at the roar of anger. She had no idea what she was doing, nor had she been planning or preparing at all. Thank god, he’d been having Scott prepare.

“Scott,” he said. “Kira, a word?”

They glanced between each other but followed him out the door and down the steps.  He was sure that Isaac was dying to know what was going on, so he ushered them into his car and took a deep breath.

“I assume that there are reasons that you are hiding things from me, like the fact that your records are blocked?”

“Yes,” Scott said.

“I’m not really concerned, but if there’s something in them that I should know, I would hope you would tell me sooner rather than later. I am having this conversation with you two now before I announce it to the rest of the pack besides Aurora.”

“Is this the part that you tell us she’s useless?” Kira asked. “And Scott’s definitely a go for emissary fill-in?”

Derek raised an eyebrow, “You knew?”

She snorted, “Of course I did. She can’t read Kitsune, she can’t speak it and rather than saying it, she plays it off. She didn’t follow any of the meetings you had me bring her to.”

“Same goes for pixie,” Scott said with a sigh. “She sat the whole meeting with her mouth shut.”

 _That would explain why you two were giving the reports,_  he thought with a sigh.

Pixie and Kitsune were languages that you could get by without knowing if only because the races were so well-tempered that you would not offend them. The meeting to be held would not go over well with an emissary that couldn’t back him up. He knew phrases, though he wasn’t fluent in much besides human languages (i.e. Spanish) and lycan. Laura had been a master of at least three human languages and had Claudia’s help for a brief time. Talia had had Claudia Heironim for what she didn’t know.

“How are things coming?”

Scott and Kira blinked, “Erm… alright I guess?”

Derek almost groaned, “Scott… tell me you’ve been preparing.”

“I have been!” Scott protested. “Kira’s been helping me, but… I’m not exactly trained for this.”

Derek smiled at that, “I wouldn’t be having this conversation with you if I didn’t believe you could do it.”

“B-But I don’t know anything about anyone. I almost failed _English_ and I speak it! I still think Kira should go.”

Kira giggled at that and Derek shook his head, “I’ll get Lenara to teach you a few things.”

“Are we sure Aurora is completely useless? More useless than me?”

“Yes, dear. She’s a druid so people will expect a lot of other things from her… which will be bad because she doesn’t have them,” Kira said glancing over the list. “But everyone loves a pixie, remember?”

“That’s what Derek said...”

“People like pixies, Scott,” Derek said, humorously. “Their pranksters but harmless, fun even. Druids are known for their knowledge and capacity for understanding, Aurora has none of that. At least with you, they’ll take it in stride. People expect fun from a pixie and it’ll take the edge off of the more diplomatic part of all this. We’ll have to wing it, but at least a little pixie dust goes a long way towards loosening people up.”

Scott groaned as Kira passed him the scroll, “Looks like it’ll be me then.”

“You’re not the only one that’s going to suffer,” Derek said with a sigh. “It’s going to be one stressful night.”

Scott didn’t like what this meant for him, but Derek promised to get him anything he needed to be ready for next week. Kira offered her help with gestures, but ultimately Scott knew that this was going to be a disaster. Maybe he could play it off with some pixie dust or something…

It took a few hours for Lenara to be free enough from her lover and her shop to hike into the woods with the pack. She almost walked right past the spot because of how normal it felt. There had been no residual energy, no anything.

“Whoever tamed it did a hell of a job.” She said. “There’s nothing left.”

Aurora seemed the most upset and Lydia didn’t seem entirely happy about being proven wrong.

“That doesn’t mean something else didn’t happen,” Lydia said.

Lenara laughed, “Young banshee girl, taming a death spot only leads to one conclusion: a complete closing of the portal and a dispersion of the magic that was there. It being on a ley line means that at the very least it had to be dispersed. If something had come through there would be residual traces of the otherworld all around, but there are none. The portal is closed and the ley line is free to flow again.”

“What about the barrier?”

“It’s been reinforced so we definitely have a little more time left. You should thank him.”

Lydia snorted, over her dead body.

Later, Lenara loaded Scott up with books and told him to come by and study with her for the days leading up to the event. He felt like his head was going to explode from the moment he stepped into Lenara's shop and where he exited with a notebook full of notes and no sense of what he was supposed to remember, he knew it wasn't going to get any better. ...

*

Stiles found himself wandering the town with Melissa on her off day, shopping for the McCall and Stilinksi house. They talked about three years of gossip and Scott and the Sheriff's antics.

“I swear, everyday Stiles! And don’t even get me started on his birthday…When he’d get your presents in the mail, he was so happy and then so sad. He’d cry puddles of flowers, oceans… I just took him to the more desperate parts of town and let him cry.”

Stiles laughed, he could only imagine.

“And your father... _Is Stiles here? What if he never comes home? What if I never get another letter from him? Why is he sending letters anyway? Why can’t he call? What if his throat’s been ripped out?_ ”

He smiled and hugged her, “I’m sorry Melissa to put you through that... “

She shook her head, “You owe me. You’re not allowed to leave Beacon Hills for at least twelve years.”

He winced, “12 years? That’s a pretty steep interest rate isn’t it?”

“ _Oceans of pink and yellow tulips, Stiles_ ,” she said. “ _Oceans._ ”

He laughed and said they’d have to negotiate as he had friends he had to go visit in other places or they would cry oceans of fire if he didn’t. Flowers were suddenly not a bad alternative.

“Fine,” she said. “But no longer than two weeks at a time.”

He was sure that he would have to talk her down a little more, but settled for carrying the groceries into the McCall house for her only to see the living room covered with stacks of books. Melissa gasped.

“My son… is reading?”

Stiles laughed, “Don’t say it like he doesn’t... “

“Comic books don’t count Stiles.”

He shrugged and continued towards the kitchen to find Scott and Kira looking into the refrigerator.

“I can’t learn things when I’m hungry Kira. And pixies don’t do well under stress. This is a lot of stress!”

Kira only shook her head, “I promise Derek will reward you and I’ll reward you, just relax a little and that’s the third time you’ve looked in the refrigerator.”

“He does that,” Stiles said from the doorway. “When he’s nervous but too nervous to really eat.”

She nodded in wonder as Stiles set the bags down on the counter and closed the refrigerator door. He took Scott by the shoulders and steered him out of the kitchen towards the living room to sit on the couch and shoved a roll from the bakery in his hands.

“Bread helps,” he said in explanation. “Like sugar, but more steady.”

Kira nodded and felt like she should be taking notes. She wanted to spend more time with Stiles just to get a better idea of Scott and she could see that she was right in her assumptions: Stiles and Scott were like brothers.

“What’s with all the books?”

“Wiccan greetings, Kitsune taunts, dragon farewells--my poor little pixie brain can’t handle the pressure.”

Stiles looked to Kira as Scott began to tear into the roll he’d been given.

“Derek has asked Scott to be his emissary for the upcoming negotiations,” Kira said. “Because our emissary is useless and up to no good. We’ve been preparing for a couple of weeks just in case, but Derek dropped the bomb today.”

“And he needs a crash course on being an emissary…” Stiles said slowly. “Poor Scott.”

Kira only shook her head, “He’s been doing okay, but we went to dragons and he kind of freaked out.”

He nodded, “He had a bad run in with a were dragon when we were kids… before the barrier went up.”

Scott shuddered remembering. The were dragon had been all shifted out with wings and serpent eyes shaking the pixie dust out of him into its mouth. Licking him and humming, _tastes good._ It clawed at him until blood came to the surface and took its time savoring the taste of pixie dust and blood.

“ _Pure bred pixie, what a treat…_ ”

Stiles had been the one to save him, casting a hell fire spell and teleporting them to the McCall house. They’d been ten years old at the time and border patrol had been tied up with a different threat. Wild were-dragons that stayed shifted all the time were insanely attracted to Pixies. To them they smelled like sweet meats and fire, a perfect snack really. Scott was lucky to still be alive.

“It’s alright Scott,” Stiles said. “No one’s going to eat you.”

Scott nodded shakily and shivered.

Kira swallowed, she hadn’t known that. They talked about a lot of things, but she’d yet to hear any horror stories. Apparently, there was a lot she didn't know about Scott.

“When’s this supposed to be happening?” Stiles asked.

“In a few days.”

Stiles winced, hence the frantic state of the living room. This wouldn’t be easy. Last minute cram sessions weren’t ever easy.

“Alright,” he said with a breath. “Since you’re my bro, I guess I can help you not get Beacon Hills attacked by the neighboring territories.”

Scott looked up at him with the roll in his mouth, “ _Rery?”_

He laughed, “Really. I’ll help, promise. It’ll be like cramming for the English midterm all over again.”

Scott shook his head, “I really missed you senior year.”

He laughed, “I bet you did.”

Stiles reached for the nearest book and Kira took a seat on the other side.

“Let’s start with Wiccans…”

They were up for most of the night working on it. Derek had excused Scott and Kira from patrol to work on the project, yet somehow all the information was just too much judging from the list. It was an extensive one and Derek had to be desperate if he was asking Scott. He was probably burying his head in books too, but even if that could work, they would still need a miracle. Days of cram sessions passed and it was finally the day.

They’d been cramming at the Hale House. Kira and Stiles throwing questions at Scott and Scott… got about 40% of them right. He was far better at gestures, but not by much. All in all, Scott would appear to be an emissary in training and that at the least would be better than a rude Druid girl.

“And I need fancy clothes,” Scott said as he stood in the middle of the Hale House. Kira was there with him, handing him bites of bread and Stiles was there too surveying the suit that Derek had acquired for him.

It was a nice suit, probably fit Scott like a glove but would do nothing for his nerves. Stiles skimmed his fingers over the seams, threading a little bit of luck and peace in them. They were simple charms that he’d always done for Scott right before a test. Pixies didn't do well when stressed and Scott was a pretty high stress pixie.

“Get into it,” he said lifting it up to him.

“You know how bad I am in fancy clothes…” Scott said as Kira muscled him into the bathroom with her to get changed. He shook his head.

Derek was still in his study probably doing the last minute cram thing that never worked for anything but nerves. When Scott came back out, Stiles whistled. If anything the spells were working as the jittery sprigs of pixie dust weren’t happening as much anymore. The suit absorbed it and maybe eased it. It was quickly appearing more relaxed and worthy of a young pixie emissary.

“You clean up nice, Scott. Do a little spin.”

He did so while shoving another roll in his mouth and Kira laughed, “You look good.”

Stiles shook his head, “Not yet.”

Derek came down the stairs to see Stiles tying an emissary half cloak over Scott’s suit and pinning it in place on his shoulders. It was the color of the pixies: a bright cheerful blue and bore the crest of Beacon Hills. Derek had wondered where all the emissarian cloaks were and wondered if Aurora had nagged Lenara for one. He was sure that the woman said no and would always say no so long as it was in her power to do so. Wearing the cloak was an honor to be bestowed, to be earned. Aurora had earned nothing but a punch to the face after she’d thrown her name around for the first week she’d been in Beacon Hills.  Lenara had laughed in her face and pinned her to the top of a light pole with a simple spell. She wasn't happy about it and Derek had had to bribe Lenara to get her down...He'd had to make her dinner while in his underwear. An odd experience, but a funny one as Lenara and her lover, Beacon Hills only knew her as Dasha, had been in their underwear too. Some mostly naked truths had come to light and it was generally not as bad as he'd dreaded. After all, Lenara and Dasha were beautiful women even though he was sure they were and among the first druids of Beacon Hills, making them easily a few centuries old.

“Where’d you get this?” Scott asked as Stiles busied himself with intricate knots that Derek and Scott had never seen before.

“Lenara,” Stiles said easily as he worked a string of ornate knots, specifically Pixie knots, over his shoulder, across his back and under his arm to hook beneath the deep red-purple flower clasp that somehow looked anything but girly. Lenara was the keeper of such things and other things important to Beach Hills, a close friend to Claudia and had been Stiles and Scott's babysitter on more than one occasion. A cloak for every race had been made when Beacon Hills had been established per Council rules and when Claudia had died, they'd been placed in her care. The only one she didn’t have was the Wiccan one as that particular cloak had vanished with Claudia during the raising of the barrier and appeared innocuously on the kitchen table as soon as the barrier had gone up. It was the only way they'd know that she was dead and not just missing.  

Derek watched in interest, there was a knowledge to Stiles’s movements that spoke experience and as Kira asked questions about the cloak, it became obvious that Stiles knew more than he let on about emissary work and proceedings between territories. More than that there was the faint scent of magic in the air, it wasn't really potent or powerful, nor indicative of anyone in particular just magic. Derek bet that Lenara had weaved a spell into the cloak for good luck or perhaps Scott's pixie dust had changed because of his nervousness. They were both good options.

When Stiles was done threading magic into the knots and clasps to make them stay and enhance the calming spells in Scott's clothes, he stepped back to admire his handiwork. The spells were subtle, hardly noticeable and being that Scott was a Pixie, people would assume it was pixie dust soaked into the clothing. No harm no foul.

“There, now you look like a proper emissary,” Stiles said proudly.

“I don’t feel like one.”

Stiles shook his head, “Shoulders back! Have you no faith in the things that I have taught you?!”

He sniffled, “I have no faith in remembering it.”

“Well sprinkle some pixie dust on yourself and get to believing!” Stiles cuffed him across the back of his head, “Believe in pixies.”

“I believe in pixies,” Kira said and kissed his cheek. “You’ll do fine.”

Scott nodded and looked at Derek who smiled and nodded to him, “If we go down, we’ll go down together.”

Scott wasn’t sure how that was supposed to be comforting, but he nodded and followed Derek out of the Hale House and to his car. Kira and Stiles took Scott’s car away from the Hale House and wished them good luck before driving off to do something probably far more fun than making a fool of themselves and potentially putting all of Beacon Hills in danger. The drive to the recreation center was shorter than he’d thought, or maybe his nerves only made it pass in an anxious haze.

He’d never seen the Recreation Center look so put together, but everyone had pitched in to make the event as success. Scott gulped and he fumbled for his notecards that Kira had placed in his pockets. He wouldn’t remember these people, he wouldn’t remember any of the things that Stiles had shown him.

Help, help, _help_ …

“Calm down,” Derek said and climbed out of the car. “Just take a deep breath and smile. Half of getting through this is smiling anyway.”

Scott nodded and thought of the time they t.p.’d the neighborhood in daisies and felt himself smile. Or when they built the Gotham city lego set on Coach’s yard… That had been amazing. He followed Derek into the hall. Somehow, falling into step and feeling his spine straighten as they entered the building. When they entered the room, he didn’t feel nervous if anything, he felt charming and knowledgeable.

“Head Irva’n,” he heard himself say, his hand drifting to his chest fingers flexed and over his heart. “Tovankil Beacon Hills in al Alpha Hale dan' Beacon Kor'vt.1"

Derek wasn’t sure what had just happened, but he was sure that Scott had just addressed the Head of the West Palm Clan. What he'd said, Derek couldn't fathom, but since Irva’n wasn't snarling and had one of the largest groups of wizards in his territory, Derek tried not to panic. The man turned to him with a warm smile. His dark eyes thrumming with his dragon's light as he returned the gesture.

“Tova'ju or'lo tak’gva,2,” he said. “A pleasure to be here. A pixie as emissary for the Beacon Hills Pack that speaks Draco so well, how interesting. You are a rare thing.”

Scott only smiled, “We thought we could use a sense of humor and a little more beauty in dealings with other territories. Everyone loves a pixie. It was perhaps the only thing that got me accepted.”

Irva’n threw his head back and laughed and slowly, Derek was beginning to think that this night might go well. They schmoozed and chatted with every representative of the counsel and other territories and if he didn’t know any better he would have thought that Scott was a trained emissary. He’d even got agreements to begin talks about lending a few wizards and high class druids out to help reinforce the barrier, or, at the very least, study it so they could fix it themselves. It was turning out better than Derek had anticipated. Dinner was served, they ate and chatter and as Derek thought, Scott’s natural pixie charm backed by the sudden burst of knowledge made everyone relax and negotiations go smoothly.

“For a young emissary,” Irva’n said to Derek quietly. “He is well-versed in the world. You have done well, Alpha Hale. Your mother and sister would be proud.”

Derek thanked him for his kind words and tried not to let the rush of elation show. It was no surprise that Irva’n knew his mother, no surprise that he knew her well either. When they were bidding the last of the guests goodbye, escorted to the portal by guards and members of the pack, Scott took a deep breath and immediately began to shovel the leftover bread in his mouth.

“ _So nerve wracking…I talked to a were-dragon--am I insane?”_

Derek laughed a bit, “Nerve wracking? They liked you.”

He shook his head, “No, they liked _him._ I don’t know what kind of magic Stiles worked, but that wasn’t me at all! You really think I would talk to a were-dragon without fainting?”

“You sure? It all seemed to be well within your personality. And you don't give yourself enough credit when it comes to bravery.”

“I mean, sure I was talking, but all the emissary stuff definitely wasn’t me. I spoke _dragon...dragon!_ ”

Derek laughed and ushered him into the car, sure to be careful of Scott's basket of bread, to drive him back towards the loft where everyone was waiting to hear how it went. Kira was on him in seconds.

“Are you okay? All in one piece?”

“He was fantastic,” Derek assured and looked across the way to Aurora who glared at the half-cloak resting on Scott’s shoulders.

“Get me out of these fancy clothes please?” Scott whined.

“I’m sure Kira can oblige you,” Derek said pulling on the string that undid the intricate knotting across his shoulders and folding it over his arm. “You did well. I’ll see you all in the morning for Scott’s choice of breakfast.”

“Pigs in a blanket! With _cheese_!” He said and Derek nodded. He owed it to him… After all his wishes for rewards were simple: a break from patrols, breakfast of his choice for two weeks, and free time. Kira’s had lined up with his demands; the only thing he was missing was how to pay Stiles for his help.

“He likes curly fries.”

He’d gathered that, but since it was the only thing he could offer Stiles besides money, he would make sure to procure some of the best curly fries he could find...after he returned the cloak to Lenara and kept it away from Aurora's greedy and jealous eyes.

She was the emissary not that scatter brained pixie! It should have been a dress in her size--not a suit in Scott's. It should have been her on Derek's arm schmoozing, making deals among the glitz and glam--not Scott. She'd tell her uncle about this for sure. She'd go next time-cloak and all.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Translation:
> 
> 1 Welcome to Beacon Hills on behalf of Alpha Hale and the Beacon Clan/Pack.  
> *Kor'vt is the word for an officiating community in Draco
> 
> 2 You welcome me here as a friend ?  
> *A question because of the history of dragons eating pixie and standard courtesy for official meetings in dragon culture


	5. Recovered

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Shopping, talking, and the preparations for pack night. Stiles has a lot of money, a lot of angst, and a lot of things to do. But first... Blue Bell Ice Cream!
> 
> Warning: BAMF! Stiles

Stiles didn’t sleep very often, but he was very good at lying still for long periods of time. Druids called it meditation, but he never liked the idea of meditation. It was too serious and didn't fit what he was actually doing. He like to call it communing with his inner god, or “Chat time with Stiles”. “Fun time with Stiles” had been reserved for masturbating until he couldn't see straight. He wasn't sure when the last time he'd had “Fun time with Stiles”...Probably before the Nogitsune had possessed him. He winced, that couldn't have been good for his balls considering that he was still a teenage boy. What had happened to the Stiles that jerked off at least a few times a week just for clarity and whose major concern (because classes were never a concern of his) was not graduating a virgin...? In his defense, that had been a simpler time and maybe he wouldn't have graduated a virgin if the Nogitsune hadn't possessed him. The years after had been filled with other more important things than getting off surprisingly.

The thought of masturbating now seemed laughable so “Chat time with Stiles” was the next best thing. He'd started the night before and rose from it the next morning. A few days passed that way.

It had been a few days since he allowed Scott to use his knowledge for the event when Scott appeared in his house carrying bags of food.

“Stiles! Derek sends his payment!”

Stiles floated down the stairs, his bedsheets tied around his neck in a billowing cape. It felt like something he should do at the time at the very least to keep up appearances.

“You have come to pay homage to me, I see… Show your offerings so I may pass judgement.”

Scott set the bags on the table, stuck his hand in one and shoved the contents in Stiles’ mouth as he stopped beside the table. Warm, soft, seasoned curly fries...

“You are a true believer…” Stiles nodded and took a seat to partake in the ridiculous amount of curly fries with chili and cheese, without, with cheese and jalapenos, and burgers that were so delicious he almost cried.

“Derek says thanks,” Scott said. “And thank you for whatever it is you did.”

Stiles laughed, “It’s just a little magic, nothing too fancy.”

Scott rolled his eyes, “Where’d you get all that stuff from? Do you speak dragon?”

"The proper term is _draco_ ," He said with emphasis and a bit of fire behind the word. “And yes, I do, fluently.”

“And pixie?”

“ _Mor’in._ ”

“And everything else? Do I magically know all of that stuff too?”

“Si,” he responded. “I learned a lot while overseas. And no it doesn't work like that. You'll remember things though, but giving you access to my knowledge is easier than giving you a full copy. You'd have to practice a _lot_.”

When he was younger, his mother would teach him the things she knew to keep him focused. He'd been a great and voracious student. He'd wanted so badly to please her, yet he somehow never felt that he could. He would never be Claudia Hieronim's heir, nor her son. It had burned him to no end, kept him chasing for that goal, so he learned everything, and spent a lot of time with Lenara and Dasha. Even before he went overseas, he'd been well on his way to being an emissary. He'd applied for the top emissarial school in the territories, his mother's alma mater. He'd gotten all the way to through the rounds and had merely been waiting for the final reply before the Nogitsune took hold, before he died...

Scott bit his lip and nodded, “Would you… tell me? We’ve talked a lot about Beacon Hills and me but not about you… What have you been up to these last three years?”

Stiles took a breath, “Well, it didn’t involve curly fries…”

Scott remained silent and Stiles figured that he was actually serious. _Damn._

“You don’t have to tell me the gritty details…”

Stiles shook his head, “That’s not it at all. It’s just… being back in Beacon Hills feels like a dream sometimes… One that I’ll wake up from way too soon.”

“Are you still having nightmares?”

Stiles nodded. The nightmares had lessened with the addition of every seal, but they had always been strong because his MDI had always been strong and Beacon Hills was filled with ghosts. And even the seals didn't keep them all at bay...the most frequent one was of his mother cursing him, disowning him and everyone he ever loved turning their backs on him. He dreamt he was back in Eichen House For Disturbed Supernaturals too, but those were less terrifying and more uncomfortably real.

“I’ll tell you, if you really want to know…”

“And one day, you’ll tell me the rest?”

He made a wry face, “Pushy little pixie aren’t you?”

Scott grinned, “Always.”

He nodded, “I went to Poland and I was there for about a month before Babcia decided that it was time to train…”

Babcia had told him clearly that if he was going to be up all day, he might as well tire himself out enough to go to sleep for a few hours at a time. So, she made him her apprentice for a month, slowly teaching him that he still had the same amount of control as before, the same amount of skill, before turning him loose to travel with his uncles… The traveling band of Wiccans that hunted bounties and saved villages in the Hostiles or on the borders of territories. They'd also been peacekeepers and acted as emissaries between groups in the Hostiles. It was an occupation unsanctioned by the counsel, but one they recognized as necessary. Territories were more grateful that someone was handling the guarding of the sanctioned borders so they didn't have to as Beacon Hills was the only territory in the world that had and barrier... one that people still didn't fully understand.

“I went everywhere with them. I was sure that I was going to die most days and they, like me, didn’t do portal transport so we walked.”

“You walked across Europe?”

He nodded, “And Asia, Africa... sort of hitched a ride to Australia. I went everywhere, wherever they would take me. It was great. I spent a lot of nights in the Hostiles.”

Scott shuddered at the thought. The Hostiles were the spaces between territories where the banished and the rogue spirits lived. Lawless places that either didn’t need or didn’t want help. Some of them had good reasons, others were just criminals, or were-dragons that liked to eat pixie children like kettle corn.

“There are a lot of good people in the Hostiles,” Stiles defended. “I learned to fly in the Hostiles while I was with a dragon clan.”

“You… were with a dragon clan?”

He nodded, they were friends of Babcia and Claudia and it was after his uncles got tired of him cutting in on their share of the profits from each venture...It wasn't his fault that the leader's liked him and the way he used his healing magic. Doctors were always paid more. They sent him straight to the dragon camp in the middle of India. He’d had a tan for all of a few weeks before the creamy paleness came back with vengeance. For that trip, he had to gate hop and then trek. He’d been terrified that he wouldn’t materialize on the other side. When he’d met Rava, head of a Hostiles clan of dragons, she’d told him that he had much fear and far more courage. She would help him control himself so that gate hoping would not cause so much fear.

“She didn’t tell me that meant I had to learn to fly the dragon way.”

“What’s that mean?”

He grinned, “Dragons don’t conjure spirits of the air to lift them. They change their ley lines to harmonize with the earth and sky and control their flight that way… given that they were perfect for teaching me to control what had ultimately become my fate.”

They were a nomadic clan of blue and green dragons and he’d stayed with them for nearly two years before they dropped him off with a druid tribe in Italy. They’d placed seals on him to help him with the nightmares and the residual energy that came with moving his personal ley lines. They’d taught him to meditate and condense the energy. In the end, it turned into a constant condensing of magic within himself so there was always a large reserve he could draw on no matter where he went. When he'd gotten tossed into the magic wastes on his way back to Poland, that had come in handy. Creatures the devoured magic lived in those sorts of places, feeding on the magic of the area until there was nothing left. Stiles had needed every ounce of his strength to defeat the starving swarm. 

“Sounds like you were a Wiccan Samurai Jack...a wiccurai jack.”

Stiles snorted it had been a bit like Samurai Jack. But… then he was back in Poland learning more about the healing arts and whatever anyone in Warsaw would teach him. He'd regenerated a whole half of a body after a dragon had taken a bite out of a father trying to save his little boy. He'd been on the edge when Stiles had gotten him free and did his best to heal the man and then fight the dragon off. He gate hopped across the globe, just about everyday to train with people and then one day he found himself at the end of the road and heading back to Beacon Hills.

“It was amazing… I learned a lot and it was probably far more than any emissary program would have taught me.”

“I’m sure they wouldn’t have let you hang out in the Hostiles…”

He shook his head, “Never in a million years! I got letters of course requesting my application, requesting a check in and all that, but I never answered. I keep them like little trophies... and sometimes spare toilet paper.”

Scott nodded with a smirk, “Is it because of what happened?”

He nodded, the counsel had abandoned him and all of Beacon Hills and he couldn’t ever forget that. They’d abandoned him when he needed a sense of normalcy the most and he would never forget that either. They were cruel and evil and held a vendetta against Beacon Hills, the idiots. Due to their neglect and arrogance, a sixteen-year-old boy was possessed by a thousand year old demon for almost a year and a half. And it was only by his unfailing loyalty to his friends and family, to beacon hills that it hadn’t destroyed them all.

“You know what that pink letter said?”

“I thought it said you didn’t get in.”

Stiles shook his head, “That’s what I told Dad, so he wouldn’t know...I got those acceptance letters much later. It essentially thanked me for my sacrifice but due to my condition, they have barred me from applying to anywhere, to being an emissary...They passed me through high school with straight A's because apparently I had aptitude and said they'd keep an eye on me..."

Scott’s jaw dropped and he felt his face heat in anger. What the fuck?!

"But it's their fault in the first place!"

"Beacon Hills isn't exactly a well-liked territory. I'm lucky they didn't renege and try to keep me in Eichen House."

"But--...Why didn't you tell your dad?"

Stiles smiled but it didn’t reach his eyes. Scott hated that smile. It was the smile Stiles had when he’d spend the night at the McCall house, crawl in through the window when Nikodem was drunk on whiskey and cursing up a storm, a loaded gun in his hand and no inhibition left in him. He cast moving spells more often than not, barely moving the furniture around, trying to release the pent up energy in him.

“Because it wouldn’t matter...let him think that one school just didn’t accept me better than I was ruined forever.”

Scott swallowed and bit his lip. He knew that when Claudia died, right before they started high school that it had been rough. Nikodem had been busy with alcohol and the station, more alcohol and the station… so much so that Nikodem just didn’t have any time to gear towards his son. The reports from everywhere, but school came in about them causing trouble all around town, getting into it with those that were favorites of the Council… cursing and hexing them to stage Shakespeare plays every year on the same day, all day. It had become a bit of a territory holiday. There was a stage on the spot where they would be forced to come for the rest of their lives.

But things like report cards and parent teacher conferences had never bleeped on Nikodem’s radar. After all, Claudia had always gone to things like that and, without her, he felt no reason to entertain the idea. He knew Stiles was passing at least, but anything more slipped his mind. Stiles always received his report cards in the mail and never bothered Nikodem with them. It hadn’t mattered. Nothing had mattered when Claudia had died...when she’d left the cloak on Stiles’s shoulders and went off.

Scott shook his head, “Enough of the gloom. Tomorrow is Pack Night and Allison has elected that we go out for celebration. My goal however is to get you laid.”

Stiles snorted, “Laid?”

"Yes, so much gloom it's time to get back that year of high school and go back to when your virginity was the single biggest issue of your life."

Stiles nodded, those had been wonderfully simple times....

"I don't have anything club worthy."

Scott grinned, "I know someone who would be more than willing to fix that."

Somehow, Stiles knew he wasn't talking about Allison or Kira. It was Dasha. She'd beamed at him, grabbed her hat, put on her shoes and hurried them towards the strip mall.

"What kind of club? And what's the end game?"

"Erm, Allison didn't say, but we're getting him laid."

"Preferences, Stiles?"

Stiles laughed, "I'm pretty sure I go both ways."

His treasure trove of porn from high school, which had also been oddly organized when he’d arrived in Beacon Hills, had been eclectic. BL novels, GL novels, books, magazines on BDSM, ABO had been a favorite if only because the thought of being held down and fucked into and clear headspace had been tantalizing. It didn't really matter if it was by a man or a woman. Now, he wasn't sure if it was emotionally safe or not.

"Masculine twink chic then," she said and turned to look at him fully. Tape measure eyes skimmed over his loose traveling clothes.

"You need clothes. The old ones won't fit."

That didn't sound like a question, so when she heaved a stack of dark jeans he wasn't surprised.

"How do you know that?" Scott asked. Stiles didn't look any bigger or smaller to him.

"He's grown, muscled up... all that hard labor out in the Hostiles..."

Stiles laughed, but she was right. None of his old clothes fit properly. They were short in the legs, tight in the arms, and he couldn't get them over his thighs. He'd been slumming it, avoiding the chore of going to buy my more clothes by wearing his old sweatpants and bro tanks. Sure his ass was a little more pronounced in them and he looked like and total college bum rather than a wiccan, but he didn't care. The list of hiring places including the Sheriff's department, the library and the grocery store on the main strip in the city, hadn't even called him back for an interview...no doubt looking suspiciously at the phrase "traveling the world" on his application. He couldn't blame them and he couldn't tell them what he'd actually been doing either, so there was no real pressing need to look for more clothing.

"Try this on," she said handing him a dark blue blazer.

Apparently, she'd been reading his mind again.

"Also, bro, what happened to your cell phone?"

"It was cut off when I left," Stile said. "Had no use for it overseas."

Scott put that on the long list of things to change as Dasha surveyed the fit of the blazer and nodded in approval.

"Sexy twink," she said and then tossed it in the approved side of the basket before pushing him towards the fitting rooms to try on jeans.

"How have you been getting around? You know your Dad kept the Jeep right?"

"He did-- ugh, too small...I haven't seen it."

"He's been keeping it at mom's house for safe keeping... or rather it ran away to mom's house."

He laughed throwing a pair of jeans over the top to Dasha. A few more pair came over the top before he'd found a cut that fit and stepped out. Scott was fairly attached to his heterosexuality, but, if he wasn't, he probably would have worked really hard to pick up a Stiles while he was wearing those jeans.

"Sexy twink chic, right?" Dasha said with a grin.

"You are now attractive to gay guys."

Stiles laughed and couldn't stop, he'd really had such simple worries in high school. He turned to look at them in the mirror. More than anything, they seemed to cup his ass and thighs tightly. They were definitely club jeans and he thanked god that there were no rhinestones.

The trip went that way until Stiles had a new stack of clothes. Dasha paid for them despite Stiles protesting.

"A Homecoming gift," she said. "You can buy me lunch."

After Scott dragged him into the nearest cellphone store, which happened to be T-mobile, and forced him to buy something that looked like a small tablet before they went to lunch. Scott had placed Stiles on his phone plan "at least until he found a job" and Stiles had shoved money in his hands to pay for the tablet-phone’s first contract year. Scott gawked at the wad of cash.

"What the hell did you do overseas?"

He grinned, "Hard magical labor. Where's the bank around here?"

Stiles went in to open up around account with a banker alone around two o'clock leaving Scott at Dasha's wandering hands’ mercy and free to ask what exactly "hard magical labor" could entail.

She shrugged, "Dragon taming, healing, bounty hunting... practically anything that the territory's controlling group, Pack, Clan whatever, isn't up to snuff or don't care to do. Oh, and treasure hunting..."

Stiles came out about an hour later with a folder of forms, a receipt, and a temporary debit card.

"So... why did that take so long?" Scott asked as he came out. He’d never had opening an account in Beacon Hills, take that long.

"Credit run, counting money, signing forms, general banking stuff. Depositing gold will have to be done elsewhere… and I have to transfer stuff from Poland."

Scott blinked, "You're carrying around gold? You have a Polish bank account?"

"It's a major currency in the Hostiles and how else was I supposed to pay for things overseas?"

He pulled out a gold coin it wasn't stamped with any currency Scott recognized, but it looked old like it could have been--

"Is this a fucking dubloon?"

Stiles shook his head, "It’s much older than that. Old gold only matters to humans in their museums. I got it on a dive with some archeologists. Neat huh?"

Scott shook his head, what the fuck?

“Do you remember how to use American cash?”

He snorted, “I paid for my phone bill, didn’t I?”

Scott had to concede that point. They dropped Dasha off at home with Lenara before heading to the McCall house. Scott opened the garage and Stiles felt his throat tighten at the sight of the old blue jeep. By human standards, it was practically ancient made of the quality of metal that they didn’t make anymore. A rustic feeling that he barely remembered. It was dusty and probably still smelled like curly fries, or pixie dust, it was hard to tell which it would be considering that Stiles ate a lot of curly fries with Scott in the jeep.  The 1976 3-speed CJ5 jeep had survived his mother’s crazy driving, spells, his driving, their high school shenanigans and apparently three years sitting perfectly still. He smiled warmly at it as Scott ran in the house to get the keys and shut off the alarm.

When his mother had bought the car, it had been a piece of junk, but perfect opportunity for Saturday afternoon bonding while Nikodem was asleep from a double shift at the station. Claudia had been dressed in her Claudia Hieronim wardrobe when they arrived. He’d been all of two or three at the time. They spent a Saturday afternoon in the junkyard to find it. He hadn’t known what she was looking for, but when she found it she only grinned and placed a hand on the hood of the car with a satisfied smile. _This was it._ It had been without a top, without doors, without tires, the seats had been ripped up and dirty, the flooring was partially rotted through and it looked like it had been through a lot.

“ _A good CJ5 is hard to come by,”_ she’d said. “ _This one is a fighter._ ”

The human junkyard owner gawked at the magnanimous Claudia Hieronim with a random little kid in a junkyard and said she could have it for two hundred and she kept a tally of everything else they collected while there. Together, she’d had Stiles levitate it towards the front of the junkyard where they’d walked in along with all the other pieces. The man had looked at them in shock...After all, Stiles was only a toddler, there was no way he should have been able to levitate a car on his own. Thinking about it now, that was probably why the Council thought she’d had a daughter… He’d been wearing androgynous clothing, sandals, and a fisher’s hat with tiny frogs on it and he had such a round face, the moles, the coffee and honey colored eyes--easily mistaken for a girl.

They wandered around the junkyard and Stiles was careful not to touch anything. The midday energies were already getting to him and so long as she had him levitating things and following her around with them suspended in the air, there was a constant outpour of energy. At some point, the human vanished into the shack of operations; looking back Stiles assumed that was when the call to the council was made about a daughter of Claudia Hieronim. She found four worn down tires, a lug nuts, bolts and others and the like until it seemed that everything that the little blue jeep was missing was there, suspended in the air. Of course, the doors and the hard top were the wrong color and model, but that hadn’t mattered.

She told him to hold the items, including the jeep in the air in a straight line so the human junkyard owner could make a tally and give her a bill.

“ _You planning on rebuilding the car? The engine’s dead._ ”

She hadn’t agreed and paid him an extra twenty for use of the space for the next ten minutes. Stiles remembered focusing hard not to drop anything, constantly redirecting the energy into holding things afloat and then maneuvering them under her direction. Tires in place, lug nuts, bolts, a junked radiator, changing and shifting, until the jeep looked more or less intact. Melissa and Scott had arrived a few moments after Stiles had settled the jeep on the ground. Melissa had kissed him, told him to be good, gave Scott his lunch and was off to work.

Scott had winced at the look of it and pitched a glowing, dense ball of white pixie dust into the open door. The door had slammed shut and the jeep had trembled before the door opened to reveal the restored leather seating. The exterior scratches had vanished and the smell went from putrid junkyard to fresh roses and lilac causing the human to gawk ever more. _Who the hell’s kid is that?_ Maybe he’d earned another call to the council about a super powered pixie child. Claudia gave Scott a high five and checked her watch.

_If you can get it started, we’ll go get ice cream._

The junkyard owner had handed over the keys and the title to what had once been a jeep gutted of everything but the rusted out engine. The three of them climbed in, Claudia conjured two car seats to sit them in and closed the door. Stiles remembered the shift at midday. The energies of Beacon Hills were highest and most active at midnight, but noon and dawn were hotspots as well. It was noon when she closed the door and Stiles could feel all the energy hitting the outside of the jeep, trying to get in, drawn to him and Claudia. Sinking into the metal of the jeep, but worse than that, he’d felt the accumulation of magic in his tiny body spilling out of his control seeping into the seats, towards the engine, the empty gas can, through the fuel lines and charging the car’s battery. Claudia grinned and rolled down the windows. Energy rushed in, but was quickly redirected into the car, conjuring gasoline out of nowhere, fixing the spark plugs to brand new, inflating the tires and the like, so when Claudia turned the key in the ignition the car roared to life. They waved goodbye to the human who cursed that he hadn’t charged them more for the parts if they were just going to revive the car.

Stiles laughed at the memory, that guy was probably pissed off and complaining, maybe even demanding that a new rule be put up about it. The jeep was really the only place that he ever managed a completely clear head.

At first touch, he felt the jeep remember him and roared to life. The engine revved and the battery began to charge through the alternator. More than that, he felt his mother’s presence as if she was in the driver’s seat with a mischievous smile, coming to pick him up from a hard day at school.

_Let’s get ice cream in Texas. Blue Bell creamery gives samples for tours…_

He smiled, yeah… Blue Bell ice cream and maybe a drive up the mountains sounded like a good idea. The door opened and he felt her hands on his shoulders and grinned, hopping in the front seat and looking at the gauges. The gas tank was empty, but it always was after a sizeable hole had been blown into it during one of their escapes. When Claudia had died, Nikodem had planned to junk the car, but since the title was in Stiles name as it had been willed to him, he couldn’t. After the hole had been blown in it and Stiles and Scott had stopped on the side of the road, Nikodem thought for sure that he’d get rid of the jeep once and for all.

_It’s a waste of money to try and fix it and there isn’t anyone around that can magically fix it, Stiles. She’s gone and the car is dead._

He remembered that the jeep had revved to life and threatened to run Nikodem over after those words left his mouth. Scott came back with the key as Stiles rested against the driver’s seat, feeling his ley lines shift to harmonize with the jeep, the ghosts that inhabited it welcomed him. Tiny smiling faces of him and Scott in the back seat, in the passenger seat… learning to drive stick with Claudia in the passenger seat… so many memories that his eyes burned and they were spilling down his cheeks before he could stop them. Scott climbed into the passenger seat and said nothing as he rested his head on the steering wheel, still crying until his sweats were darkened with tears and his head was hurting. The battery was fully charged and he the seat belt snake around his waist: closest thing he would get to a hug.

Scott watched quietly as the seatbelt moved to fasten him in, and fastened Scott into his seat. A haze of light and a rush of wind circled Stiles as he cried and the tears began to slow. The key flew from his hand and into the ignition, turning the jeep on and humming as if it wasn’t more than thirty years old and from a junk yard. It purred and the radio whirred to play “Pocket Full of Sunshine” and Stiles burst into laughter. Flushed cheeks and tear stains aside, he laughed and it was a real one. Scott couldn’t help but laugh to.

“Enough doom and gloom,” Stiles said with a nod of his head. “Fair enough.”

He took a deep breath and wiped his face, “How about ice cream?”

“From Texas?”

Stiles nodded, “From Texas.”

The windows went dark, blocking the view from the outside as Stiles shifted gears and pulled out of the driveway. Scott clicked the garage door closed and reset the alarm as they pulled out into the street. The song changed to “Unstoppable” and Stiles wondered if maybe instead of a spirit of the air, Claudia had possessed the car… or maybe she was bending the radio waves to indirectly possess the radio.

As they headed towards the Highway portal, people on the street gawked at the car. The windows were blacked out now, but they knew that Jeep. That was Claudia Hieronim’s little blue jeep and from what they remembered there were only a few people they ever knew to drive it: Talia Hale, Claudia, and the Sheriff after she died. Logically, they probably figured it was the Sheriff in the car, or maybe it had finally been possessed by the spirit of one of them, but it had been non-existent for the last three years.

A man on the street cheered as they drove past, not really sure why, but he did. They passed Derek in his Camaro as they drove by and even the alpha had to break his car harshly to figure out what exactly he’d seen. He put on his hazards, got out of his car to watch the little blue jeep turn a corner and stared after it for a long time.

“Wasn’t that…?” a woman said on the street. “Emissary Hieronim’s jeep?”

Derek nodded, the license plate was the same, he remembered it: 6FMQ803, it was practically ancient and had once been in a junkyard he was sure. Seeing it again made him smile a little bit, how much trouble had that little blue jeep been in?

“Who’s driving it?” the woman asked. “Did the Sheriff sell it to the territory or something?”

Derek shrugged, “Probably his son.”

The woman looked at him shocked, “ _Stiles?_ ”

“Yes.”

She shook her head, “Why given that troublemaker the emissary’s car. Shouldn’t it be in the museum or something?”

Derek shook his head, “As far as I understand, the jeep was left with the Sheriff.”

“It should have been given to her daughter. Who knows what kind of magic is in that Jeep. A low level Wiccan shouldn’t drive it around, it’s like asking to be attacked and killed.”

Derek leaned against the car to regard the woman, she had one of those faces that spoke volumes about how she lived her life and a scent that made him think of a lot of nose-lifting and elitist behavior. He really hated that.

“I’m putting in a complaint with you Alpha Hale and the station, letting someone like that drive around in that car is like stepping on her name.”

Derek winced at that, but charged forward, “You said… she had a daughter?”

The woman looked at him, “Yes, Alpha Hale, it’s rumored that she had a little girl. She was there when Emissary Hieornim went to the junkyard to build the car… at least that’s what the junkyard owner said.”

“And you have no idea where this little girl is now? Who her father is?”

She shook her head, “No one’s ever seen the little girl with Emissary Hieronim except for a few times, usually in the jeep. We just assumed that she was hidden away somewhere or left Beacon Hills after the emissary died.”

“What’s the name of this junkyard owner?” He asked.

If Claudia Hieronim had a daughter, it meant for sure that she knew _something_ about the barrier or at least enough about her mother to be of help. The woman wrote the name and address down for him, then bid him good day, heading towards the police station to file her complaint with the Pack representative at the station and the Sheriff's office. Derek was almost sure that there would be a line of complaints and his head throbbed at the thought of them all eventually landing on his desk.

***

Stiles drove to the highway portal and smiled at the man at the post. With his hood drawn and his hair pressed down, he was sure that the man thought for sure that he was a ghost and the figure in the passenger seat was someone else.

“Em-Emissary Hieronim,” he stuttered. “Y-You…”

Stiles shook his head, “ _Brenham, Texas_.”

The man hit the gate button and dialed in a code that he probably hadn’t in a long time, still staring at Stiles’ face. The magic circle glowed with power and the portal appeared before them as they drove towards it, Stiles could see the man pulling out his phone to take a picture and picking up the other phone to call. Stiles rolled up the window. He’d forgotten how iconic the little blue jeep was.

Portal hopping in the jeep was always an odd thing, but he didn’t feel the usual apprehension about it either. The other world’s inhabitants didn’t even seem to notice them and Stiles thought for sure that it was because the jeep was steeped in so much of his, Scott's, and his mother’s magic that it felt like just another being in the realm. When they drove into the Brenham magic port, Stiles grinned and took the familiar road towards the Blue Bell creamery and the little store that sold everything Blue Bell. They hopped out and she came running out to greet them, remembering the little blue jeep.

“You’ve gotten taller Claudia, where have you been all this time?! Where’s that precious little girl of yours anyway?”

Stiles did his best not to wince but smiled, “I’m not Claudia.”

The woman blinked and looked at him. The face was practically the same, yet the person before her was definitely not Claudia. The fall of clothing made it nearly impossible to ascertain a sex for sure, but Claudia’s little girl would be about this person’s age now if she remembered correctly.

“Oh dear,” she said slowly. “I’m so sorry, you look just like your mother dear… hair and all... Joachim wasn’t it?”

He smiled, “Yes. This is Scott.”

Her jaw dropped, “You grew up so well! Come! Come in! Honey! It’s Claudia’s daughter and her boyfriend!”

Scott flushed and shook his head, “We aren’t dating.”

The woman paid him no mind and led them inside, chatting with the cantankerous old man who looked as though he would have a heart attack at the sight of Stiles.

“She only passed on half of her best assets to you, sweet cheeks. What a shame.”

Stiles tried not to be severely creeped out as the woman swatted the old man who cackled maniacally and continued to track Stiles’s ass around the store. Scott grabbed a basket and went to Stiles’s side as he opened the freezer and pulled out a half gallon of cookies and cream ice cream.

“You’re not going to correct them?”

Stiles shook his head, “No point in that.”

“So where is your mother dear? We haven’t seen her or you in years!”

Stiles filled the basket that Scott held, “She… she died about seven years ago.”

The woman swallowed, “Oh… dear. I’m so sorry.”

Stiles shook his head, “She’s never really gone.”

She shook her head, “Of course dear, wiccans and all that. Well, if you need anything, be sure not to be a stranger. I’ve always wanted children to guide.”

Stiles thanked her for her kindness and paid for the stockpile of ice cream with his temporary debit card. The woman gave them cookies the way she always did and a bag of oreo crumbles to take with them.

“I remember that they were your favorite on top of dutch chocolate.”

He nodded and hugged her before turning towards the door. The old man swiped at his ass and Stiles was lucky to dodge it before stepping outside. They came out to see them off as Scott loaded the ice cream into the back seat when Stiles felt it a shifting before he was running towards the spell coming their way. It twined around his arm, crackling lightning and fire, burning his grey hoodie, but as with most of Stiles’ old clothes, it was so steeped in magic that it did little more than leave scorch marks.

“Poachers! Scott! Get them in the house!”

Scott shut the door of the truck and moved to get the old woman and her husband in the house. He called up a thick line of magic vine dogs to stand guard and keep the last line of defense.  

“A pixie, a wiccan, and the little blue jeep! It’s our lucky day boys!” said the snarling voice on the other side of long line of the whip.

“What about backup?” Scott asked running up behind him. “Call the territory!”

The whip was made of red dragon scales and a kitsune heart for the handle. Fox and dragon fire and Stiles felt his stomach roll.

“They won’t get here in time,” Stiles said. “And I’m pretty sure that they’re in cahoots… how else did they know Claudia Hieronim’s jeep would be here?’

“Wiccans really are smart,” the man said stepping into sight with his gang. The man was human no doubt, hyped up on vampyr blood and maybe sporting a bunch of protection charms. “Bet that brain of yours will fetch a good price… what’s your blood line anyway?”

The wind howled angry and he heard the jeep rev and turn to face the oncoming group.

“Not one you want to fuck with,” Stiles replied as another whip shot out, wrapping around his leg.

“Get back Scott,” Stiles said. “These whips would kill you instantly.”

He did so warily, “What do I do?”

Stiles shook his head, “You wanted to know what I did overseas…”

Scott wasn’t sure what that meant, but there was a surge and the electricity and fire seemed to be dimming as Stiles’ hair began to stick up more and more, electricity passing through it and the poachers trembled, one started and then they were all running forward.

The whips went dim completely before the running men realized it and Stiles was on them.  Lightning coursed through them at each landing of his fist, but careful to arc around the heart. He had no intention of killing them after all, just incapacitating them. As the foxfire dimmed, dragon fire took its place leaving sizzling patches of flesh and fabric where Stiles’ fist had landed.  The leader watched the fury of a dragon and maybe a fox fill Stiles’s eyes glowing red with traces of lightning as his men fell. He fumbled for a pentagram made of mountain ash and latched it to a net and threw it.

Stiles caught it and glared at him, “ _Mountain ash? What am I a werewolf?_ ”

He dropped it, advancing on the remaining two, the dragon’s dying breaths and the kitsune’s gasps of pain thrummed through him, angry and empowered for revenge and redemption. He caught the man by the throat and lifted him up.

“M-Mercy! You have to give me mercy, you’re a wiccan!”

“ _You skinned her alive and you have the nerve to cower?_ ” He growled, edges of dragon fire edging along his tongue. “ _You descaled him while he still lived and you believe I should show you mercy?”_

 _“_ It’s a wiccan rule!”

Stiles laughed, “True… but it says nothing about what mercy means now does it?”

He slammed the man to the ground, squeezing and paralyzing him with a shock of magic. The other man who’d been well on his way to escaping, found himself running in circles right back to Stiles thanks to Scott and was quickly put down by Stiles to the ground. The two of them carried so many artifacts that Stiles wasn’t sure where to start.

“You will take me to where you keep all of your prisoners and your wares and then… I’m taking you to the Hostiles to be dealt with.” Their faces paled and Stiles grinned, “The Council may give you a slap on the wrist, but I know a clan or two that will not take kindly to the things that you have done.”

“I said mercy!”

“Mercy at my hands you get, mercy from the people whom you have wronged… you don’t deserve. Be glad I didn’t have the jeep run you over.”

Stiles got up and used an arc of lightning to tie the whole band together. Scott called off the vine dogs and made sure everyone inside was all right.

“That is her daughter no doubt.”

Scott winced a bit, but took control of the jeep, following Stiles to the trucks the poachers had been driving. He set the band of them in the cage in the back of one and enchanted the trucks to return to home base. He heard the sound of faint gasping and pain, screaming agony and took another breath before entering the decrypt and sprawling base. A large trailer hitched to a truck occupied the lawn beside it. It was scratched on the outside and he bet the inside was filled with more people. One poacher remained, standing guard while prodding a were-leopard with a poker. Stiles knocked him out and sent him to join the rest in the cage. Scott stood watch over them, covering the cage in paralyzing vines while Stiles began to open cages. The were-leopard was a teenage boy who’d been taken from the Hostiles of Mexico while trying to make it across the Rio Grande. Stiles spoke calmly to tell him his name, his race, his place of residence, and the fact that he was there to help.

“ _Where am I?_ ”

“In Texas at the moment,” he said kindly, casting a healing net over the boy’s arm and shoulder.

The boy, Miguel, offered his help with convincing the others that it wasn’t a trick and began to help him unlock cages and trappings. The worse off were healed first and so on before being taken out of the sprawling house. Scott gaped at the numbers of people coming out of the house with still no sign of Stiles. He got out of the jeep to smile at them lightly and try his best to explain that he was also there to help when one of them stiffened and said that there was a poacher missing.

“What the hell are you doing?!”

He heard from the house and Scott felt his stomach drop.

Stiles felt the bite of a hot rod through his hoodie as he crashed into the wall. A werewolf was the leader of the poachers it seemed and that pissed him off even more.

“You think you can make off with all my hunts?! I’ll sell you piece by piece--”

His voice was cut off by the edge of Stiles’s foot in his throat and the pulse of magic that sent him flying through the front of the house and into the dirt outside. Stiles came out next, fire in his eyes.

“ _You would hunt your own kind?_ ” Stiles practically roared and the man snorted.

“I’d hunt anything for the right price.”

Scott winced at that as Stiles rushed forward into the half-shifted man, he was so fast and the blows were so quick that Scott wasn’t sure what had happened until the man had shifted back, his eyes rolled back and he fell to the ground.

Stiles grabbed him by the hair and dragged him with a strength Scott never knew he had before threw him in the cage with the others. Taking another breath and regarding the group of newly freed people with a smile, he directed them into the trucks and anywhere they would fit before heading back into the house to finish freeing people. Fairies in jars, pixies bleeding black, blue, and white pixie dust, it had been a large operation it seemed. After the house was clear and even under the floorboards were checked for traps and other illegal weapons, he went to the trailer and began the work of trying to save the lives of those who were still barely hanging on. The sun was setting and Stiles was glad for the boost. When everyone was accounted for according to the master inventory that the werewolf kept, Stiles turned on his phone and called his father.

“ _Sheriff Stilinski,”_ he said gruffly.

“Dad, it’s Stiles… know anyone really really after a poaching group called the… O’Brien Pack?”

“ _Yes…huge operation, wanted all over the United States, missing children, kidnapping, murder, everything—wait... why are you asking?”_

“Know anyone trustworthy in Texas? _”_

***

When Stiles got off the phone with his father, he was sure that the man would have a few words to say… about the entire affair. The story would go of course that Scott had done it all and Stiles was just fine with that. When Derek and the head of the clan that controlled the South Central Texas territory that surrounded Houston arrived, Stiles did his best to appear innocuous.

“We just came down for ice cream for old time's sake!” he’d said. “But Scott’s such a hero! And then they had to attack us for the jeep…you know? Tried to tell them that you know there’s nothing really special about the jeep, it just had a really special owner once upon a time.”

Derek sighed and looked at Scott whose heart had kicked up, the way it did when he lied, but he didn’t speak about it.

“A pixie did all this?” the Clan leader asked skeptically.

“Well… there was that girl we met...she was around, but she left so…”

Derek blinked and regarded Scott who’s heart always betrayed him, but somehow Stiles was either telling the truth or extremely good at telling a lie because Derek somehow didn’t sense anything off about it at all. As the clan began to question Stiles about the girl, Derek pulled Scott aside.

It was odd to know that it was a lie and to hear the story that Stiles was spinning as a slight twisting of the truth… the fact that Stiles had changed clothes completely in a matter of seconds had only added to it so when the men came to, they were blabbering about a wiccan woman in sweatpants.

“Where did you meet this girl?”

“In Beacon Hills, said she liked the Jeep we let her get in because even if Scott’s happily dating, Stiles isn’t! And she was hot you know?”

“Scott,” Derek started and looked at him. “I’m not sure what you’re lying about, but good work.”

Scott blinked and nodded, “I expect to hear the truth one of these days however… for now, try not to freak out you did good work.”

Scott nodded slowly and when the statement was taken from Stiles and the man came to question Scott, he gave him the exact same story… not word for word because no one could quote Stiles directly really, but it was the same story as the poachers and the like. Those that had been kidnapped were escorted to the nearest portal to go home to the arms of their families.

"Your names?" A young were-deer asked before the escort came for her. "I am sure the others and I will never forget them."

"I'm Scott."

She looked at Stiles and Stiles caved at the dewy brown eyes looking at him, "Stiles."

She thanked them again and went with the escort before giving one look to Stiles and Scott.

 _I will remember you,_ the look said and Stiles nodded. As would he. After all, they'd all witnessed him as a wiccan fighter and the harmless friend of a pixie. They had kept his secret, though he wasn't entirely sure why he was still keeping it...

The amount of evidence against the O’Brien pack was staggering, but the amount of time it would take to get it all processed would take time. They would stand trial and probably be exiled from all territories. Stiles climbed into the jeep with Scott and headed back to the portal.

“Why did you lie?” Scott asked after a moment. “That whole thing… was a lie.”

He shrugged, “Who would have believed the truth?”

Scott blinked and thought about it… no one would have. The lie was large, but it was so easy to tell because they already had eyewitnesses to the fact that Scott and a girl named “Joachim” went to get ice cream in a blue jeep. She’d been driving said jeep out of the Beacon Hills gate and there was reportedly at least one other person in the car with her. They’d been attacked and someone wearing Stiles’ clothing wasn’t mentioned anywhere in the events… presumably because he’d been in the jeep the whole time.

It was brilliant… and terrible all at the same time.

“I don’t think this is right.”

“Mom divided her life in half to make Hieronim and Stilinski as two different people… enough to make a golem to definitely give the two different dates of death… The “Daughter of Claudia Hieronim” thing started way before the council started it… It started with the jeep.”

Scott nodded, remembering how odd he thought Stiles had been dressed that day… and all the other days he’d been in the jeep. They were androgynous clothes. Jeans, t-shirts, shorts… all in the same style that Claudia wore them, a wiccan tunic on occasion, but nothing that screamed _girl._ On the other hand, when they were the Stilinskis...Stiles wore obviously boy things and Claudia Stilinski was always in a dress, toting lemonade and sweets. Hell, even Scott slipped sometimes in thinking that they were two separate people.

“You’re going to keep this up?”

“At least until I figure out why it was started in the first place.”

"The circle just got a whole lot bigger..."

Stiles snorted and guided the Jeep towards the Loft.

 


	6. Pack Night Out (Scott is the Best Best Friend Ever)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles is a dirty, dirty dancer. Scott is the Best Best friend ever and there's no sense in holding grudges. 
> 
> Warning: SEX!

True to his prediction, the O’Brien Pack were banished from ever entering any Territory. As if that was going to deter them from doing anything else to destroy what little sanity people had. Stiles knew that the council was just doing them a fucking favor and caught them just outside of the main gate of the Central U.S. Territory in the same clothes he’d rounded them up in and the same attitude. With him, were the clan, pack, tribe, mob and gang of every group in the Hostiles that had people taken from them by the poachers. They were all angry and prepared to make them suffer.

Just as he promised.

The O’Brien pack blanched seeing him and the group of people.

“You didn’t think I’d forgotten about you, did I?”

Alpha Richard Crowne glared at the werewolf leader and took claim of him by the throat. One of the victims had been the alpha’s own granddaughter after all.  The rest of them were split among the remaining leaders.  Stiles had no doubt that they would all pay for their crimes the way the should now that the rules of the Hostiles were given free reign over their fates. He gestured his departure and ignored the pleas for help from the men before heading back to Beacon Hills.

When he arrived back, it was about time to start getting ready for a very long Pack Night Out to celebrate the negotiations that had gone so successfully and Scott’s heroic aid in busting a major poaching scheme and putting Beacon Hills on the list of “Zero Tolerance for poaching” territories related to the Council’s organization. Yes, it made them look god, but it also made Beacon Hills an even larger magnet for anyone who needed the assurance that at the very least, the Alpha and his Pack cared. With the influx of magical peoples and human alike, the barrier was getting a boost and staving off the eventual collapse of it.

Scott had come to the Stilinski house after the press had swarmed and flopped on Stiles’ too small but super comfy bed. Exhausted and munching on fresh yeast rolls that Derek had sent him home with. He’d had a nap, but at the moment all he wanted to do was lay absolutely still for a little while longer. No press, no statement, no anything,

“This mattress has to be at least twenty years old, why is it so comfortable?”

Stiles laughed, “Magic. Where are we going?”

“Allison says we’re going Wicked,” he said. “You remember Wicked, don’t you?”

Stiles snorted, how could he forget. It was full of rave lights, magic drugs, and horny people. It wasn’t a pronounced gay bar as that was Jungle’s schtick, but everyone regardless of sexual preference went if only because they had the best D.J. in the entire Beacon Hills Territory. He and Scott had spent a lot of time there holding up the wall and trying to chat up girls… and failing for the most part...Well, Stiles failed mostly, Scott did pretty okay.

“Are you going to dance this time?” Stiles asked teasingly, shuffling through his closet to pack up his old clothes for donations.

“Kira likes to dance… so I’ve had to learn. What about you? You never danced before.”

Stiles nodded, “I learned.”

Scott wasn’t sure what it was about the statement that made him curious, but it did. The tone said something about whatever Stiles had learned, but he wasn’t sure what it was so he didn’t ask. Instead, he waited until his alarm went off to go shower while Stiles was still packing up clothes. There was a knock on the front door and as the door opened, he supposed it was someone they knew.

“Stiles? Scott?’

“We’re upstairs!”

Three sets of footsteps came up the stairs and he looked up to see three women in his bedroom doorway. Kira, Lydia, and Allison all dressed up for partying and in skimpy clothing. Tight dresses and heels that made it impossible for the average man to concentrate. They looked like they planned on causing trouble that night even though they all wore badges that designated members of the Beacon Hills pack.

“I’m going to be honest and say, this moment is going down in my mind as the only time three women have come to my bedroom looking so tantalizing.”

Lydia made a face while Allison giggled and Kira shook her head.

“Oh Stiles,” Kira said. “Where’s my pixie boy?’

“In the shower, hopefully not making vines grow up through the drain again.”

Kira laughed as she and Allison filed in and bounced themselves onto his bed.

“So comfortable…”

“Stiles,” Lydia’s prim voice came and Stiles looked up at her.

She was still as pretty as she had been in high school, maybe more so. At one point in his life, he would have been trembling at the thought that she even knew his name, but now all that had faded. She was a fond memory of a simpler time in his life. She looked uncomfortable, trying to formulate the words that she needed to say, needed to be heard, but couldn’t convince her lips to speak.

“Lydia,” he said almost amused. “You’re welcome to sit too. No grudges about thinking I’m evil incarnate.”

She blinked and in true Lydia fashion glided over to the bed to take the last edge of it. It really was a comfortable bed and somehow that wasn’t what she expected. The Stiles she remembered from high school was dorky, kind of spastic and definitely had a crush on her. She couldn’t weigh in on his intellect as he did his best not to talk in class, but he was observant… the fact that he knew she kept high level magic books compressed between magazine covers meant that at the very least he knew her in ways that others didn’t.

“What are you doing?”

“All my old clothes don’t fit anymore,” he said throwing another set of pants into the box. “So I’m donating them.”

“Did you grow?”

He shrugged, “Enough that only my sweats fit decently.”

Kira and Allison traded a look and when Lydia joined, they knew that it was a mutual decision: Stiles had a nice ass. And while not as broad as Derek, or shaped like Scott and Isaac, he wasn’t exactly bad to look at. He had broad shoulders and a body that tapered to a trim waist and a rounded ass that made sweatpants almost as sinful as they looked on Derek.

“Where’s Erica?”

“She’s coming, got caught up at the last minute with a vampyr thing.”

He nodded and could understand that. Vampyrs were once a week mingling people as they had to keep everyone up to date on everything in case of an emergency. He didn’t know if Erica was affiliated with any covens in the area, but, if she was, she was no doubt meeting with them. Then the door opened and they all yelled that they were upstairs. Erica, in her wedge boots, thigh holster sporting her badge, and mini dress rushed up the stairs with flair.

“The fun has arrived!”

Stiles grinned, “That’s my line usually.”

“Well you were already here and there was no fun so obviously it’s my line now. Why aren’t you dressed…”

Her words faded off as her eyes began to get dark looking at Stiles. He took another breath and met her eyes calmly. Vampyrs were drawn to him even before the Nogitsune, something about the angst that was always floating around him was tantalizing, but not maddening. The fact that he'd been absorbing most of that angst tainted magic and residual guilt from his clothes as he packed them up probably only made it worse, but he couldn't let his magic soaked clothing get out of the house. That would have led to major issues that he didn’t even want to think about.

“Erica? You can’t eat him.”

She blinked and slowly her eyes turned back to normal, she smiled brightly, “Sorry… about that it. You just…”

He nodded and stood with a box in his hand offering his upturned palm towards her, “I know. No hard feelings. It’s nice to meet you, Erica. Call me Stiles.”

Erica smiled, placing her hand beneath his and slicing a hot red bleeding line across his palm and licking the blood from her thumb before shaking his hand and healing it.  Her eyes fluttered at the rush of the blood on her lips and Stiles smiled pleasantly and meaningfully at her.

“A pleasure to meet you at last,” she said with a purr. “You are delectable.”

“Thanks.”

Scott came up behind her, “You can’t eat him, Erica.”

“I know, but the moment I can…”

Stiles laughed, “I thought you had a boyfriend.”

Erica pouted. They really were fun killers. Scott crossed the room to kiss Kira and pull out a crate to sit on from the closet so Erica could have the chair. And then they were as a group looking through the articles that Stiles could fit and dressing him.

“If you’re coming to Pack Night Out, you have to look the part.”

Stiles let them do as they pleased and maybe in a show of a truce, Lydia pioneered the choosing of his outfit until they were all satisfied with it. The jeans that Dasha really liked and Batman t-shirt and a dark blazer. When he’d gotten done fighting the vines in the shower and actually showered, he was more relieved to see himself in the mirror. It was a face he recognized. His hair was still wet, but he looked like nineteen year old going out for a night on the town. He smiled a bit at his reflection, all of Scott’s hopes for the night aside it was already turning out better than he imagined. Allison styled his hair if only because he’d had no intention of doing it. She managed to get it spiked enough that his face appeared a little more square-jaw ish and less round. Boyd and the others were catching their rides with Aurora which meant that Stiles was either going to ride with Lydia in her snazzy four seater, Scott’s car, or the Jeep.

“I want to ride in the classic jeep!” Kira voted and that was that. Lydia called shotgun. The doors flung themselves open, the jeep honked and they all piled into the jeep.

“Claudia Hieronim once drove this jeep,” Kira said shivering a little. “I feel important just sitting in it.”

Stiles laughed at that and started the engine, turned on the head lights and pulled out into the street.

“So, this girl you all met on your way to get ice cream…” Lydia started. “Who was she?”

“Didn’t really get her name, I think the shop lady said something about Ya-him or something?”

“Probably heard her wrong,” Lydia said. “Why’d you pick her up?”

“Why does any hot-blooded man let a hot chick into any car?” Stiles asked in that poetic way that made Scott shake his head.  “She was more into Scott though.”

“You probably scared her,” Lydia said. “Being weird.”

He shrugged, “I like spastic better.”

“Did you grow out of your ADD then?”

Scott’s jaw dropped, “Lydia!”

Stiles blinked, “ADD?”

“Yes, everyone said that’s what you had…and how weird it was for a Wiccan to have a human disorder.”

Stiles blinked and glanced at the rear view mirror as silence washed through the car. The radio roared to life.

“You a stupid hoe, you a-- you a-- stupid hoe…”

Stiles laughed as did Scott and Lydia looked at the jeep’s console suspiciously.

“You didn’t even touch the dial…”

“The jeep has a mind of its own,” Stiles explained and turned the volume knob down. “And I think she's getting offended. I saved her from the junkyard and the museum after all.”

“The Sheriff was going to junk it?’

“Before he realized that it was imbued with magic, yes.”

“But it’s iconic!” Kira said and Stiles nodded.

That’s what he’d said. He was really surprised that the jeep had survived his father’s wish to get rid of it while he was overseas, but he bet it was just the fear of having to deal with Stiles tearing through Beacon Hills to recover his mother’s jeep that had ultimately stopped him. The jeep running away to Melissa’s house wouldn’t have done it after all.

Lydia remained quiet for the rest of the ride and eventually the volume turned back up and the radio turned to something a little more party ready. They parked and clamoured out as Derek pulled up in his Camaro. Erica climbed out first to greet Boyd, Jackson, Derek, and Isaac. Aurora stepped out of the back of the car and they wondered what exactly she was doing there. Derek looked more annoyed than usual, but at the sight of the blue jeep his expression softened and his eyes zoned in on the person climbing out of the driver’s seat.

“You have possession of the blue jeep?”

Stiles let one eyebrow rise at the question, “Are you checking my license and registration? Cause they’re all up to date.”

Derek shook his head at the snark, “The number of complaints about not knowing who owns the blue jeep now has flooded the Sheriff's office and he isn’t giving any details.”

Stiles nodded, he’d known that would happen. Claudia Hieronim was a goddess, everything she owned should have been immortalized as a monument to her greatness. Stiles was a fuck-up and should really have no right to even be mentioned on the same page as the late emissary… his own mother.

Fucking Beacon Hills...

“Yes, it’s mine. Dad wanted to junk it when it stopped working, but it seems to like me well enough to start up again, so it’s mine. Not a museums, not anyone else’s. Mine.”

The lights flashed seemingly agreeing and Derek nodded, “That’s nice to know. Was the girl in Texas Claudia’s daughter?”

He shrugged.

Derek somehow felt that there was more than one lie being told, but a large impenetrable wall that may have been Stiles Stilinski, was keeping him from figuring it out. Before he could ask any more questions, Allison was distracting them all and focusing them towards the entrance of Wicked. She’d apparently called ahead to let them know that they were invading Wicked that night so the bouncer only smiled at them and let them all in. It was as loud as Stiles remembered, but bigger. They’d expanded the dancefloor and the bar as well. There were stairs that led up to the balcony. Dancers in cages suspended and positioned throughout the club and the D.J. booth high above the dancefloor.

Derek knew this was a bad idea, if only because it was loud and forced him to dial back his hearing significantly if he wanted to still be able to hear anything. Stiles offered them earplugs.

“Specially made for clubs,” he said. Derek took them gratefully and felt like the music had been turned down to tolerable levels except for the reverberation in his chest.

They made it to the bar for drinks. Supernaturals were allowed to drink at eighteen as they matured differently than humans or whatever b.s. that the council thought would sound good and appease the masses. Kira had tossed back her drink like a seasoned drinker as Scott tried to get through the sickeningly sweet daiquiri named after Pixies.

“Dance time!” She said as he finished his drink and grabbed his hand leading him out towards the dancefloor.

Erica dragged Boyd out next who prayed for a reason not to but apparently the only thing he could see for the rest of the night was sex, so he couldn’t really complain no matter how rhythmless he was. Aurora seemed content to stay near Derek who didn’t seem to be doing anything more than tracking his pack members through the crowd.

“You’ve got to lighten up,” Stiles said. “Have some fun.”

Derek raised an eyebrow, “Says the man who is also still at the bar.”

“Not for the same reason,” Stiles said finishing his drink and bidding him goodbye.

Derek shook his head and looked at Aurora who did her best to flutter her eyelashes and asked him to save her a dance. Yet another thing that would turn out badly for the pack. He hadn’t quite figured out how to get Aurora’s crush on him to go away.

“Maybe if you fuck her, she’ll become more useful,” Isaac suggested.

Derek shuddered, “Go, before I hurt you.”

Isaac shrugged, it was a perfect suggestion in his head. Derek watched them until he and Allison disappeared into the crowd and the music picked up--a pop song by someone that he should know, but didn’t. His eyes scanned seeing the pairs of people, even Aurora managed to find someone to dance with and eventually Derek had enough watching and found a flirty brunette who was more interested in how he fucked than his name or status… if only to quote her. He wasn’t really attracted to her, but there was no harm in having a bit of fun.Lenara said he should act his age a little more, let out the wolf a little bit more and chip away at that depressingly large block of angst in his chest.

He’d just found the rhythm to which Kira was rocking when it struck him that he should have been looking out for Stiles and making sure he got away from the bar. He wasn’t there when he looked and after a quick scan Scott managed to find Stiles through the crowd near the center of the dance floor dancing as if he’d been born to do so.

“Holy shit,” Scott said. Kira looked in the direction he was looking and her jaw dropped.

“Got… to get him to teach me how to move like that.”

Scott think he’d be able to handle that, but wondered what the fuck had happened to his best friend while on the other side of the world because he hadn’t known Stiles to be able to dance and look so good doing it either. When he was approached by a couple, it seemed that the proximity to the two only made whatever spell the music had cast over him intensify because Scott and Kira weren’t sure if they were dancing or having a very bisexual threesome on the dancefloor.

So you pray to god,

To justify the way you live a lie,

Live a lie

Live a lie

***

To be honest, Stiles wasn’t sure what provoked him. Maybe too many nights in the Hostiles fearing for his life and losing his mind to the beat of dragon drums. Maybe the music, maybe the lyrics and the sound of the beat and the reverberation of it in his chest made him think of those nights and the way he'd brushed up against the gates of peace while moving to the beat of the drums. He did know that the man and woman who approached him were beautifully powerful creatures and he just couldn’t help himself.

Because when I arrive-- I--I bring the fire

Make you come alive-- I-I can take you higher

What the sense forgot--I must now remind you.

Let it Rock

Let it Rock

The guy behind him didn’t seem to mind the way the music took over his mind and made him a practical slut on the dancefloor. The fact that he could keep up with the woman in front of him didn’t seem to bother the woman in the slightest. ANd the truth that every move he made was a silent and artful scream of “FUCK ME” didn’t seem to bother either of them. If anything, they were enjoying it. In his defense, he was hyped up on pre-Nogitsune Stiles magic laddened with guilt, desire, and angst…  and they’d approached him to dance. He hadn’t figured out where he stood on going home with them yet, but it wasn’t something he was going to worry about when it was obvious that the girl in all chocolate skin and luscious curly hair appreciated the fact that he had no problem keeping up with her sensual grinding and gave as good as he got. He was hard and the friction sent sparks through his vision that he wasn’t completely convinced was just pleasure at the way the woman moaned and the way his hands shook. He was probably dripping with sex magic.

The guy was bigger than he was, towering over him and he knew instinctively that the man was some sort of were-creature. His hair was a rich golden color and his eyes were a deep green.He would have bet a lion or tiger from the way he moved and his obviously dominating personality. The woman was probably a vampyr if the quality of her magic was any indication…If he was right, her star had come into alignment and the man behind her wouldn’t be enough. Interesting that they’d chosen him of all people. It had to be the dancing… or the magic, maybe both.

“It’s Pierce,” the man said in his ear. “She’s my wife, Gia. And fuck you’re good at this.”

“Stiles,” he offered trying really hard to focus through the roll of Gia’s ass against his crotch.

They were spikes of pleasure that he had barely remembered from high school, but he pushed back just to feel it again and the zinging clarity and emptiness he felt. The absolution and freedom--yes, he remembered and had been craving the reprieve since he'd  absorbed all of the magic he'd left behind. Memories had assaulted him all day, since the tour of his school, the locker room, his locker and of course living in his bedroom.

Fuck me. Sex. Killed her. Guilt. Hate Me. Hate Him. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

It probably didn’t help that they were both obviously high ranking and the whole club was filled with sex and magic. His ley lines were drinking it in and he was sure his pupils were blown from that alone. The angst and guilt was soon being replaced with the touch me, touch me, touch me, fuck me, fuck me chanting of the magic flowing into him and it was slowly blotting out all other thoughts. If he wasn’t careful, he’d give himself away. Maybe.

But fuck he was a teenager! Did he have to be in control of himself all the time?

With great power came great responsibility.

Did he ever mention that he hated the Spiderman movies?

Pierce’s hand on his hip and then Gia’s hands in his hair, her lips on his neck and Stiles felt the ghost of fangs against the flesh of his throat. He shook his head trying to clear it, he’d never let a vampyr feed from him before, mostly because he wasn’t sure what it would cause his ley lines to do. Blood was such a close connection. It was also a sort of unspoken wiccan rule. That pain that vampyr thrived on kept Wiccan’s level and grounded to practicality.

She only nipped him smirking slyly, “You want it…”

Not a question-- a statement. Stiles swallowed, was this even okay? Was this a good idea? Had coming out been a good idea in the first place knowing what he knew? When had they moved towards the shadowed side of the dancefloor. Her eyes were pitch black in the dark, reflecting the gold of Pierce’s eyes behind him. He wouldn’t deny the fact that perhaps a threesome with people at least half as attractive as these two were was one of his larger and more prominent fantasies from high school. Hell, it was quickly becoming a fantasy of his right now. Along with leather cuffs and whips...

He swallowed and stepped back into the solid force of Pierce behind him.

“I… shouldn’t…”

She smiled, “Why’s that?”

“Designated driver?” He tried hopefully.

Pierce snorted.

She laughed, “That’s the best you’ve got?”

“Never done it before?” He tried again.

She smiled a predatory smile, “But you’re pretty open though, aren’t you?”

"I'm wiccan."

"I want to fuck you, wiccan spirit and all."

He flinched at that, damn. She was one of those vampyr… something a little closer to a blood oracle. He bet she worked for the station.

“Uhm… nope. I’m out of responses.”

She licked her lips, “No need to worry Stiles, I know what you have.”

He swallowed as she continued, “And I promise it isn’t a problem… if anything… it will make it more… rapturous.”

“Like sex rapture or human Jesus on a crucifix rapturous? Only one of those is good.”

She smiled slow and leaned up against him, pressing herself fully against him to breath the words against his ears and, because the earplugs were magic, he heard her in perfect clarity.

“Like when he’s fucking you, you’ll get to feel how much he enjoys dominating you… And then, when I’m riding you… you’ll know exactly how good you’re making me feel.”

Stiles felt a shudder at the scrape of her fangs along his neck and the ghost of hot breath. The image of it combined  with her finger twined in his hair and pulling his head back so she had full access to his neck sent heat rushing through him and blood rushing to the quickly-becoming-uncomfortable jeans he wore.

"I'm going to ride your face while my husband fucks you senseless and then I'm  going to ride your dick until you scream for mercy and more... and then maybe when you're  a submissive mess, if you're really good,  Pierce will fuck your mouth...that kind of rapturous."

Of all the eloquent things he could say, "Oh" is what escaped from his lips.

“Give your keys to your friend if you want to come home with us and meet us at the door,” Pierce said in his ear, a hot lick up the side of his neck. “If you aren’t there in twenty, we’ll consider it a bowing out.”

Stiles swallowed as Pierce maneuvered him towards Gia who took her time wrapping her arms around his neck, stroking the lapel of his jacket in a sly way before pulling him down to kiss her. It wasn’t exactly an odd feeling to be completely at someone else’s mercy, it was, however, completely foreign to like it. She marauded his mouth with a practiced sensuality that made his stomach flip and his knees quake. It was slow and promising and when she pulled away from him and he looked at Pierce he was hit with another, very personalized wave of lust and nearly came, he was sure, in his pants like a complete novice… At least he was an actual novice.

Luckily, he didn’t have to go find Scott. As soon as they were out of the immediate vicinity, Scott appeared with wide eyes and a shit eating grin.

“So… got plans?”

“Not sure.”

Scott’s jaw dropped, “You are not allowed to back out of that.”

“It’s not that simple Scott--”

“The fuck it isn’t! How high is a bisexual threesome on your fantasy list?”

Pretty high, but that wasn’t the point.

“It’s complicated--”

“Then make it uncomplicated--.... wait… are you scared?”

Stiles didn’t say anything, taking a breath and falling back on the nearest pole to breath as the rush of sex and magic was suddenly not so impending and the wiccan, and purely Stiles, mentality surged back to the forefront.

Scott watched the emotions flickering across his face for a moment before grabbing him by the shoulder and steering him towards somewhere a little quieter. They found that on the balcony where the music was more or less blocked.

“What is it?”

Stiles reached out to his shoulder and felt his ley lines shift, the rush of pixie magic into his system and Scott looked at him strangely where his hand was and watched the beginnings of pixie dust just beneath Stiles’ skin. Scott’s jaw dropped and he watched granules begin to fall and catch in the wind, floating out over the trees near the edge of the club’s property. Flowers blossomed on the branches where the granules fell.

“What the hell man! That’s not fair!”

Stiles took his hand away and looked out, unable to help smiling at the rush of optimism. Everyone loved pixies for that reason.

“What the hell are you? First Wicc-urai Jack and now you’re Rogue?”

“I told you I came back different.”

“Fucking hell, what’s so scary about that?”

He breathed and reached out again, forcing his magic forward and Scott closed his eyes against the sensation. The amount of magic that had come flooding into him was all tainted with touch me, fuck me, fuck me …

“Stop bro, before I come in pants. That would be really awkward.”

Stiles let him go, “I still don’t know if my magic is tainted or not. It isn’t safe--”

“Fuck, that’s it?!” Scott yelled and turned Stiles towards him. “Stop with the what ifs, man. Overseas that may have kept you from dying or being killed, but this is Beacon Hills and you’re Stiles.”

“I”m not that Stiles anymore.”

“Yes, you are,” Scott insisted. “The same Stiles that will pull pranks in the middle of the night of his first night back, the same Stiles that enchants his best friend’s clothes so he relaxes during his tests is right here. You didn’t go anywhere. That spirit didn’t change you Stiles, not at the core, not where it matters. It can’t change you, you’re… unbendable.”

Stiles laughed, “The Last Avatar? Really?”

“Yes, you said that it was an advanced form of your MDI, there’s no way of knowing if this new thing you can do wouldn’t have happened without the Nogitsune happening. There’s no way of knowing if it would have either. But you can’t hide from it now that it’s here. You aren’t a coward… and I’d like to not have to kill you.”

Stiles blinked, “What?”

“You made me promise in junior year that if you didn’t lose your virginity by the time you’re 20 that I have to kill you. Your birthday is only a few days away.”

He blinked and laughed, his head thrown back. He hadn’t remembered that promise, let alone when his birthday was. He hadn’t celebrated it in years.

“What better way to bring in the big 2-0 than really raunchy sex?”

Scott nodded, “Hell that’s how I brought in mine.”

Stiles sighed, “I guess I can’t have you having to kill me on your conscious.”

“Yeah, if I have to tie you down and get someone to fuck you--I will. We’ll get Lenara to seal your magic up and then you can have all the good times you want…”

“Many, many times in a row?"

“In multiple positions!"

“Okay," Stiles handed off his keys. “Take these before I change my mind.”

Scott snatched them off his hand, rubbed his shoulders and pushed him towards the door, praying that it turned out as well as he hoped. He headed downstairs to find Derek leaning against the bar looking somewhere in between satisfied and frustrated.

“What’s wrong with you?” Derek asked looking at him.

“I just talked my best friend into having a threesome.”

Derek blinked, his eye broew lifting, “Well… sounds like you’re a great friend…”

Scott nodded he was the best best friend ever... Right behind Stiles.

***

Gia glanced at her watch and pouted a bit. Nineteen minutes and there was no sight of him, what a shame… seemed like she and Pierce would just have to try again some other time and tough it out as no one else had appealed to her that night. She looked up at Pierce who was raising his hand and looked towards the door of Wicked where the man named Stiles was standing looking somewhere in between lost and nervous.

Just kidding, she thought and offered up thanks to whatever god of sexual encounters thought so highly of her this night. Thank the gods for their mercy and grace!

Stiles took slow steps towards them until he stood before them with a nervous smile.

“Needed a bit of a pep talk.”

“Did you get it?” Pierce asked and Stiles nodded.

Gia twined an arm around Stiles’s left arm and lead him towards the parking lot towards the sleek looking low slung Lotus. Who exactly was he agreeing to going home with?  he wondered as Pierce opened the back seat and Gia pushed him in and down on the seats. When she’d crawled on top of him, Pierce closed the door. Pierce hadn’t even managed to get in the car when Gia’s mouth was on Stiles’s and her fangs were sinking into his neck.

Stiles felt it like a jolt, the snapping of his ley lines to harmonize with hers and her magic, like all vampyr was made of pure desire and he felt it filling him as she drank deeply. The crushing and constant angst of his life seemed to lift by fractions and be replaced with an overwhelming need for more. She pulled back with a gasp and moan, her lips reddened with his blood as a shudder shot through her.

“Holy blood rites,” she said softly looking down at him. “You’re…”

“Just Stiles,” he said. “Is that going to be a problem?”

She licked her lips, “Will a curse descend upon my house?”

He snorted, “No.”

Pierce had managed to get into the car and rev the engine before she was back to assaulting him with her lips, nipping, kissing, her tongue in his mouth promising to do a whole lot more than just touch. She ground down against him, eliciting desperate moans and jerks of his hips far less graceful than the work he was doing on the dancefloor. Her eyes were pitch black with circles of red by the time the car stopped and he wondered how exactly Pierce had managed to be so controlled with amount of desire pouring off of Gia.

She edged him up and back down, keeping orgasm out of his reach for the entire car ride which had to have been more than fifteen minutes. When the door flew open and Pierce grabbed them both and slid them out of the car, Stiles guessed that he was less than controlled. Gia untangled herself from Stiles as Pierce pinned him against the car, a hand around his throat, keeping his head forward as he pressed lustful dominating kisses to Stiles’s lips.

Something like a shriek escaped Stiles when Pierce shoved a hand in his pants and pulled him along with him by his throat and the hot hand wrapped around his dick. Again, his ley lines snapped to attention and a flood of predatory emotions flooded his mind, he could hear Pierce’s lion roaring demanding his submission. He stumbled after him into the house and as soon as the door was closed his blazer was off. Gia had already taken out her earrings and was undoing the wide gold belt, prowling after Pierce as he undressed and marauded Stiles up the stairs. Stiles slipped on a step and before he could even flinch for impact, he was lifted up, Pierce’s large hands cradling his ass and he was being carried. He fumbled, clinging to broad shoulders, but the spike of adrenaline, fear only made Pierce growl before setting him down on the top of the steps.

Stiles stepped back trying to get a handle on his surrounding his head. When had he lost his shoes and socks?

“Are you running?” Pierce growled, his eyes flashing and Gia grinned.

“I think he’s running.”

Stiles shook his head, he knew better than to run. Prey ran, food ran. He was neither of those things...so he wouldn’t run… Yet his feet were edging back, stepping back with every stalking step Pierce took, every slide of Gia’s foot forward towards him. He was stepping back, retreating… not running. His heart kicked up and their eyes darted towards his chest and then back to his reddened lips, his eyes....and they smiled at him.

“I’m not running--”

“I think you are. Want to play?” Gia asked, sliding off her stilettos and unzipping her dress. "We predators love the chase after all..."

Oh shit, play? He was pretty sure playing wasn’t a good thing… Predators that played with their food…. prey that was played with always suffered the most.

“--just stumbling--”

“I think he wants a chase,” Pierce said taking a step forward.

Maybe on instinct or the trepidation in his chest, Stiles took a step back and cursed. They were doing it on purpose, toying with him and his instincts and that wasn’t good. His wiccan sensibilities were already keyed up at the thought of them pouncing on him, no need to engage his very visceral, very overwhelming need to survive. He bet one of the had majored in some sort of psychology or behavioral science.

“--clumsy, me--”

“Run.” Pierce growled, his eyes flashing and Stiles, against his better judgement, ran like hell.

Pierce’s quick footsteps chased him down the hall and down the other set of stairs leading towards a pool area.  He heard the distant clatter of his phone hitting the ground and something else, but he didn’t stop to grab it. Where the hell was Gia--

The room was huge when he skipped to a halt, staring at the large pool that was more of a small lake than a pool. The surrounding walkway was covered in foliage and natural tiling.

Holy fuck they’re loaded! Maybe the type of loaded that could have him strung up in their basement for the rest of his life with no one able to get a warrant to come search for him--

Gia appeared before him, now without a dress and sporting a very sexy  gold lingerie lace set that practically glowed against her chocolate skin and reflected the hints of bronzer on the planes of her body. She was beautiful and staring at him with a hunger that made his stomach  twist and his balls ache. He backed up and stumbled down the unexpected slope into the water which was apparently a natural indoor pool as the ground felt more like seaweed than concrete. He was pulled to the surface by Pierce and into another one of those kisses that made all of his prey instincts (because obviously he was instinctively the prey in this situation) come alive and made Pierce’s predator desires higher.

Caught you.

He felt it in the tightness of Pierce’s grip and the dizzying feeling of being so damned close together and wet. The fact that his jeans were uncomfortably tight now didn’t matter.

Hands circled his waist, pulling his pants and boxers off and tossing them on the stone tiled lounge area around the pool. He shuddered feeling Gia press up against him, the softness of her across his back and her hands trapping him as Pierce pulled away. One hand teasing the length of him, the other around his throat making tiny incisions that she could lick. Pain and pleasure mingled and thrummed together in his veins making the influx of sex-magic and predator thoughts nearly unbearable.

“If I’m not careful, I’ll drain you… and then a hex really will come down on my house…”

Stiles wanted to laugh, but he was just too turned on to do so and wiggled in her arms, but she was employing that vampyric power and holding him still as she stroked him slowly, pulling him back towards the edge of orgasm. Pierce managed to get out of his jeans and return now fully naked. Stiles had been too damned distracted by Gia’s teasing touches and whispered words to take stock of what he was getting himself into but he knew that these two weren’t going to kill him, but they were definitely going to torture him as Pierce’s hand wrapped around one of Stiles’s thighs and pulled it to rest on his hip.

“You’ll enjoy it, Stiles,” she said. “I should know, I enjoy it all the time...we’ll be gentle until you can handle what you want--what you need.”

“And what is that?” Stiles managed to gasp out.

“A good hard fucking,” Pierce answered with a feral grin. “You’re about to turn twenty and I could smell the pent up sexual energy from across the room.”

“As could I,” Gia said in his ear. “It’s why we approached you. Stars alignment and all of that...”

Stiles didn’t  think that he had any of that at all, but thinking quickly became over-rated, when Gia finally took hold of him and began stroking him with abandon, forcing him to walk backward and out of the pool, towards the shower area. His eyes were open, held by Pierce’s stare as his legs trembled and the rush was coming so fast he could barely catch his breath.

“I can’t--”

His ley lines trembled, shifting towards Gia, bending towards Pierce at the same time. Gia grinned.

“Yes, you can, and you’re going to because we’re not giving you a choice.”

Magic and endorphins surged and crashed through him, rocking his mind out of balance with his spirit and he felt it push outward and surge beyond himself. He scrambled, but as the world roared his sight into blackness, he lost all grip on it and could only hold on for sanity before he was turned to darkness as well.

At the emotional flux, Gia had found herself leaning against a wall with Stiles trembling, sliding down to the ground in a heap, still shaking as the flickering light danced before his eyes. She’d slid down with him and held him, letting him grip her arms for dear life and sanity. Pierce kneeled in front of him.

“...ight?”

He blinked trying to make the world come back slowly from the roaring silence in his ears. Pierce was in front of him, looking into his eyes, concerned and hungry all at the same time. Gia’s arms were still wrapped around them and it was her strength alone that was keeping him off the ground.

“...iles, you alright?”

Stiles blinked and focused, he hadn’t passed out, he was sure of that, but whatever had just happened was something a little too dangerous.

“Stiles, are you alright?”

He nodded slowly, moving to get out of Gia’s arms, stumbling and falling to the ground, shakily.

“I’m fine… I…”

Pierce and Gia traded a look and waited for the trembling in his voice to go down before approaching him.

“I shouldn’t… this was…”

“Hush,” Pierce said, scooping him off the ground. “You’re a little overwhelmed, no one is hurt, just calm down.”

Bad idea, bad idea… too dangerous… too much… too quiet... too loud...

Gia could taste the anxiety and as she ran a bath big enough for the three of them, she began to wonder if maybe they should have worked Stiles up to it a bit more. Watching Pierce rock the trembling mess of him, she was sure he was thinking the same thing. That had mostly been her fault, she never thought completely clear on nights like this and she couldn’t expect Pierce to be her clarity when his birthday just happened to fall on the same day.

Stiles was a perfect choice for them both, yet somehow they hadn’t handled the execution well. Pierce got him into the water and it was Gia whom he leaned against while trying to still himself long enough to speak clearly.

“I could have killed you both,” he said slowly.

Gia snorted, “Sweetie, unless you can overdose a vampyr on sex, which you can’t, you wouldn’t have killed anyone.”

Stiles shook his head, he was being irresponsible… stupid irresponsible, fucked up--

He gasped feeling Gia’s fangs sink in and his head loll back until his train of thought seemed to vanish. A little less pressure on his chest.

“Are you usually so angsty?” Gia asked.

Stiles didn’t say anything, but shifted nervously. Another reason why being around vampyr was a bit of a challenge: once they had a taste of your specific sort of grief, they were attuned to it. They could tell when you were sinking into it. With all the teenage/high school pre-, during, and post-Nogitsune guilt and grief thrumming through him from being amongst all his possession again, he was probably a poster boy for what vampyr looked for when they were hungriest.

“I could have killed you.”

Pierce was the one to let out a strong, frustrated breath, “You aren’t going to kill anyone but yourself if you keep all of that pent up. Sexual frustration, anxiety, I could go on.”

Stiles looked between the two of them, “But--”

“You haven’t had an orgasm like that before,” Gia said. “So I’ll explain that it’s very similar to a strong discharge of magic, but it isn’t. That pressure you feel releasing isn’t your magic, it’s the emotional space it all takes up in your Wiccan spirit… which considering your bloodline… has the potential to be a lot. Look around for yourself.”

Hesitantly, he looked towards the door they’d come through towards the pool area. Nothing had exploded or been destroyed there was none of that lingering magical residue that was usually there when his powers went ka-boom… She was right….

Holy shit, you learn something new everyday.

“How am I supposed to tell the difference?”

She smiled, “You exist in the moment.”

Stiles considered those words… another thing that putting himself in constant danger and seals would never teach him: to exist in a moment. He’d been planning for so long that he wasn’t sure--

“Show me,” he said after a moment, not looking at either of them.

Gia smiled, “Lion-hearted this one.”

Pierce nodded, “The fiercest.”

Gia moved in first to kiss Stiles gently, stroke her fingers through his hair. The gel had all but washed out. The feel of her fingers against his scalp  lulled him into relaxing against the back of the tub, letting them do what they wanted, move him the way they wanted to and doing his damn hardest to curtail the infinite number of possibilities springing up in his head. Pierce’s had settled him against his wife while Gia, wrapped her legs around his waist and pulled him naked and flush against her, grinding against him until he panted for breath and moaned in frustration.

Pierce’s hands were on his hips, sliding slick digits into him. The unexpected intrusion sent a spike of adrenaline through him right alongside the pleasure of Gia’s lips on his, drawing sorrow and angst from him in every breath and replacing it with pure desire. His body jerked as Pierce sunk a finger to the knuckle and hit a spot that Stiles had barely ever grazed in his frantic teenaged masturbations.

“Fuck,” he breathed.

Pierce laughed, low and rough while slowly easing Stiles into the feel of his finger thrusting into him, “We will, just let me get you ready first.”

Stiles though for sure that maelstrom that had nearly killed him the last time would come crashing down again, but Pierce had no intention of fucking him for the first time in a bathtub…. just keeping him there long enough that the warmth would make him relax and the sweat of the club would wash off. Stiles whimpered, mourning the loss of Pierce’s finger, even as he drove Gia over the edge with the three fingers she’d asked for. Pierce pulled them both out of the tub, and sent them towards the bedroom. Gia wrapped her arms around Stiles, not giving him a moment to think, still high and on the edge of orgasm. A hand on his dick, the other in his hair, gripped tight and promising  to follow through on her words from earlier.

“I hope all that muscle tone isn’t for show, Stiles,” Gia said. “We have very athletic sex and we expect you to keep up.”

He didn’t get anything out, still dizzy at the constant draw on his emotional void and the stroking of her hand, the pain in his head was turning into a sensational overload that he didn’t register his knees on the bed, only the glow of her eyes, hypnotizing him.

Gia bit her lip, she hadn’t thought she’d be able to tame him, as wiccans on principle never let anyone tame them, but when his eyes began to glow in response to hers, the whiskey brown turning to a simmering, needy, trusting and desperate gold she felt the rush so much stronger. Lion-hearted wiccan, she thought. He had balls of steel really and was at her command. She almost wished she could keep him forever.

“Lick,” she said, crawling back on the massive bed until he was crawling after her. Slowly, starting from the inside of her ankle, slow licks up her legs, to the inside of her thighs until he was close enough that her hand was in his hair again and he whimpered, his eyes locking with hers as she guided him to exactly where she wanted him. At the first touch of his tongue, her body shook, partially sensory and the anticipation had been killing her. He smirked against her even as his eyes remained hypnotized and she tightened her hand in his hair, clever wiccan.

“Are you challenging me?” She asked with a smile. “You’re asking for it aren’t you?”

He responded with a long lick and a desperate moan. Pierce appeared behind him at the sound with a smile. He pulled one of Stiles’s arms to fold at the small of his back and the other to coat in lube with a smile directed at Gia. His eyes were glowing, tinged with red, that old lion dominance edging into his eyes. She almost forgot sometimes that Pierce had once been the head of a pride at very young age because he could be so gentle.

“Three fingers, G?” He asked, covering Stiles’s fingers. “I think we can do better than that.”

She trembled, but held Stiles’s head firmly between her legs as Pierce crawled on to the bed to guide Stiles’s fingers exactly where he wanted them in his wife and kiss her at the first shudder.

“P-Pierce…”

“Birthday,” he reminded. “You knew before we left tonight. I want you open.”

She did, that didn’t mean she’d been prepared fully. Pierce spoke in low commanding words, stroking Stiles’s hair as he told him exactly how to curl and slide his fingers inside her, over her ass, alongside his tongue. A finger alongside his tongue, two fingers in her ass, not all moving together and varied. He was at least a good learner and Gia groaned, her head fell back against the cushions and Pierce prowled back to where he’d been, the sound of Gia’s moaning and the slick wet sounds of fingers sliding in and out made it almost impossible to focus on anything.

Gia’s hand kept him still enough, but Stiles’s body didn’t seem to register that as it thrashed at the first lick of Pierce’s tongue up and the plunge into him. His whole body shook and the world roared in his ears. Magic flickering behind his eyelids, flooding in and filling him, but Gia didn’t let him up and Pierce’s hands on his hips made him bear the onslaught of his tongue.

“Good isn’t he?” Gia breathed, looking down at him, maybe more turned on by the sight he and Pierce made. “Really good?”

The world flickered between existence and nothingness at every slide of Pierce’s tongue, his fingers inside Gia--so damn warm and wet, she smelled like egyptian musk and sex and it was dizzying. The very fragile hold Stiles had on his sanity, the little bit of bravado he had left was slipping and the reality was coming to the forefront that he was going to have sex with a married couple after maybe a few hours of knowing them. He’d let a vampyr tame him for all intents and purposes and he was about to let a were-lion do the exact same… They were going to tame him, if only for the night.

Shit.

Gia felt the thread of panic first as the glowing flickered and before she could speak to calm his wiccan side, Pierce’s hand was on the back of his neck, holding him still as his fingers began to stretch Stiles. His body tensed and returned to its pliant state at the change in sensation.

“I’ve been going easy on you Stiles,” Pierce said. “But if you have enough coherence to plot your potential downfall, I won’t any longer.”

Gia bit her lip and squirmed as Stiles’s eyes returned to looking up at her, a stronger golden glow and she had no doubt that his ley lines were drinking in the surge of predatory power Pierce was exuding.

“You’re going to eat her out like your life depends on it, Stiles. Like it’s the only thing in the world keeping you sane… and it will be as soon as I start fucking you.”

Pierce picked up the pace of his fingers inside Stiles and added a second and then a third. The power tangled with magic and the words to sink into Stiles’s subconscious, flooding all conscious thoughts out. Please her… please him… submit… submit…

Pierce let out a groan at the first push back of Stiles’s hip against his fingers and Gia’s hand tightened in Stiles’s hair as his hand moved faster, his tongue sliding faster, deeper.

Oh shit...Gia thought. They’d tamed him. Fuck.

Pierce let out a feral growl, “Good, Stiles. Good. Push back. Good.”

He obeyed and when Pierce was sure that he was ready, he pulled his hand free and stroked his own cock with the remaining lube.

“Shh,” he hushed, stroking Stiles’s hair as he let out a desperate moan. Pierce bit his lip at the rush of need the other lashed out at him, pulling him.

Give it to me… give it to me… please, please, please, please…

He felt Stiles’s mind wiggling with need, tortured by it and grinned, pressing the end of himself against him so the boy stilled, shaking with the need to move and the spike of fear. His hands hadn’t stopped and it was then that Pierce began to slide in: an inch forward, half an inch back and Stiles could have sobbed.

“Please,” he heard himself say. “Please…”

His eyes burned, fumbling at the feeling as Pierce held him down with pressure at the back of his neck and Gia stroked his hair soothingly. The slow stretch and the anticipation, he could feel Pierce stroking against that spot he could almost never hit on his own and he hadn’t even gotten there yet. The multitude of futures had been cut short to where Pierce would end up, how Gia would feel around him, what else they had planned for him.

Fuck me, fuck me, fuck me, please.

When Pierce managed the first full stroke, he hadn’t expected the deluge of fuck me, please, fuck me to come crashing into his own ley lines, but it did, sinking hot magic fingers into him and up through his mind. ‘

Who the fuck was taming who again?

His hips moved on their own and as the sounds coming from Stiles became more prominently along the lines of “yes, fuck me, fuck me, please, harder, fuck me” he moved faster, holding Stiles’s hips still with one hand and his face between Gia’s thighs despite the force of his thrusts.

Stiles wasn’t sure what had happened, but there was that roaring freedom and a soaring absolution from everything, before an odd sliding feeling inside him and he was on his back, being pounded into.  Gia over him, a hand in his hair, his fingers in her and riding his tongue and fingers. He felt them, surging into him, through  him and through each other confused and muddled lines settling in him and branching back out to connect them all in a cloud of lust and magic--

Submit, give me more, give me more. Ride his face, fuck him harder, harder, faster…

He took a breath of air when Gia slid down his body and Pierce pulled free of him, his body shook with the aftermath and he wasn’t sure how he knew anything, even his own name anymore when she sunk down onto him. It was clearing and terrifying.

“More.”


	7. The Truths We Won't Hear

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles tells the truth, Part one

Scott woke up in the loft with Kira snuggled, naked into his side and got out of bed. He checked his phone: 5 missed calls from Nikodem and five messages… one for every half hour past eight o’clock. Scott lifted the phone to his ear.

Scott, please tell me Stiles is with you. His closet is empty and he didn’t come home.

Scott call me back.

Scott, please tell me you know where the jeep is? Call me back when you get this.

No really Scott, answer the phone now.

Scott, answer the phone for Merlin’s sake!

Scott winced, the jeep was downstairs in the parking lot beside Derek’s Camaro. They’d all come back to the Loft to crash after the club closed and that’s when he had to explain that Stiles was… occupied and would meet up with them all later.

“Scott,” Kira groaned. “What’s wrong?”

“The Sheriff has been calling all morning,” Scott said shaking his head and then there was a knock on the door.

Kira slid on one of her silky nightgowns and Scott slid into a pair of boxers before he went to answer the door. It was Derek, fully dressed and sweaty from his morning run, holding his phone. He’s frowning something spectacular this morning as if from the moment he woke up it had been bad day.

“Where is Stiles? Before Nikodem has a heart attack.”

Scott yawned, “Probably still with that couple that took him home with them…I’ll give him a call.”

Derek nodded, “Then at the very least Nikodem will stave off his panic attack.”

Scott nodded, and scrolled to Stiles’s contact and called him…

You’ve reached Stiles Stilinski, please leave a message.

He winced, that wasn’t a good sign… either the phone was dead or off… Either way, Nikodem would have a fit.

“Hey buddy, call me back before your Dad has a heart attack.”

***

Stiles woke up to the smell of breakfast being made and an odd thrumming through his body… in a bed that wasn’t his own. The sheets smelled like sun, egyptian musk and a whole lot of sex and Stiles felt himself smile a bit before getting out of bed and following the sound of food. Before he made it to the door, it opened to reveal Pierce carrying a large tray and Gia munching on what looked to be a rice cracker covered in peanut butter and jam.

Stiles swallowed as Pierce’s eyes went from green to red-tinged gold like a light switch and Gia’s eyes had gone dark. Thrumming, he thought… taming… still tamed… everyone… was still. Pierce set the tray on the nearest surface as Gia advanced on him. She’d already made good on her promises from the night before, yet somehow Stiles knew they had other things planned as it began surging through him again and she pounced, sinking her fangs into his neck and all conscious thought beyond: fuck me, touch me, let me--do it!, please! vanished.

It was noon before he surfaced from what was generally called tamed space. Pierce was feeding him and Gia bites of something cheesy and topped with eggs and bacon. It didn't  last long as noon was one of those times when energies surged... energies of all kinds and barreled into Stiles like a freight train. It knocked him straight back into tamed space. He was begging Pierce to choke him with his cock as Gia stroked into him with a sizeable strapon.  

"Fuck my mouth, please...Please let me suck you off, please."

"I don't  know,"he said holding head still and drawing sticky wet runes with the tip of his cock across Stiles’s lips.  "You could choke."

Stiles let out a moan of pure sin, his mouth open, still red from the night before, swollen and practically drooling, desperation wetting his lips, " Please choke me with it, please fuck my mouth until I can't  speak."

He wasn't sure how long they were in and out of it but when his head was finally clear he was sure that he'd fucked a guy, rimmed a guy, been rimmed by a girl, and been the middle party of double penetration and spit roasting. All in all, he felt like he did when his mother was alive: light and stable.

Finding his clothes was a bit of a trial as Gia had taken the liberty to wash and dry them with their clothes. He found his phone behind a couch he'd run past during the chase. His shoes were somewhere downstairs, but eventually he found everything. His phone was dead. He closed his eyes and poured magic into the phone while munching on toast and bacon. The phone came alive and the date appeared.

He’d been M.I.A. for three days it seemed and today was his birthday. Damn.

“Happy Birthday,” Gia said with a pleasant smile. “Maybe now you can actually enjoy it.”

He nodded and hissed at the remaining pain in his neck. She smiled and licked her lips.

“You were delectable.”

Pierce laughed being that his neck was probably not the only thing that was sore. Gia was an adventurous lover and knowledgeable about the body in ways that Pierce hadn’t ever thought possible. The first time Gia had bitten him while giving him a blowjob he swore she’d killed him if only because that was how high he felt… Stiles hadn’t fared much better during or in the post haze.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” he said with a wry grin as his phone began to chime and ding and notifications popped up. Scott, Nikodem, the police station phone and some other unrecognized number popped up along with a ton of voicemails.

“Popular aren’t you?” Pierce said as Gia looked as innocuous as possible.

“I’ve only been back in Beacon Hills for about a week,” he said. “After three years abroad with little communication…. and now I’ve gone missing for three days.”

Gia only giggled as Stiles started with Nikodem.

“Sheriff Stilinski,” he said. “Make it quick.”

“Hi Dad,” he said and shook his head as Gia laughed.

“Stiles? Damn it where the hell have you been? You scared the hell out of me. Scott didn’t know where you were, the jeep's missing--”

“I’m fine Dad, and I’m pretty sure the jeep is heading to pick me up.”

“You worried me… I was just filing a missing report on you.”

He winced, “Sorry, but that’s a little extreme.”

“Call Scott,” he said. “He’s freaking out as well…”

“Will do. Apologize to Melissa for freaking out on her.”

Nikodem cleared his throat and gave a gruff, “I have to go,” before he hung up.

Gia and Pierce started laughing outright then and Stiles only bit into his toast savagely.

“It’s all your fault,” he said flipping to call Scott. “All your fault.”

“You were the conductor in this situation,” Gia said. “So it’s your fault too.”

Pierce nodded as Scott’s phone connected.

“Stiles?! Stiles?!”

“Yes, Scott.”

“Are you dead? Did they murder you? Were they trying to? Where are you? The Jeep just drove itself out of the parking lot this morning!”

“Scott--”

“Have you called your Dad?”

“Scott--”

“What happened--”

“Scott!” Stiles yelled, amping up the carrier signal so it sound extremely loud on the other end. “Are you going to let me talk?”

“...Sorry… I was worried…And I had sugar.”

Stiles laughed, he could only imagine the sort of pixie dust catastrophe that had been unfolding for the last few days.

“I’m fine Scott… uhm… one night just sort of dragged itself out is all. I’ve already talked to Dad. The jeep is probably on its way here to pick me up… I’ll catch up with you later, alright?”

“Alright… I want details… but not gory details. Later.”

Scott hung up and Stiles shook his head, “The people that love me…”

When they were done with breakfast, Gia and Pierce walked him to the door to see the little blue jeep parked in the driveway, waiting expectantly.

“That is amazing,” Gia said walking over to it. “I’ve always wanted to see the blue jeep up close.”

“She’s a fighter,” Stiles told her and smiled as Gia leaned her body over the hood to hug it.

“Also the perfect height to fuck Gia on,” Pierce said. “I officially love the jeep even more.”

Stiles laughed as Gia threw up a leg and stroked her thigh with a wiggle of her eyebrow, “Aren’t we sexy together?”

Pierce let out a low whistle before she giggled and stepped back from the jeep.

“Don’t be a stranger Stiles,” Gia said. “Surprisingly, we’re not just good for sex.”

Stiles nodded, “Of course. Maybe next time I’ll actually get a chance to admire more than just your bed and playroom.”

Pierce nodded at him, “See you around, Stiles.”

He grinned at the two and traded hugs and numbers before climbing into the driver’s seat of the jeep and strapping in. The jeep roared to life and back out of the driveway.

“Why do I even have keys for you?”He asked, still waving the couple good bye as they watched the blue jeep head back the way it came back towards Beacon Hills city.

The first stop was the police station and he was lucky that Scott, Kira,  and Boyd happened to be there already. He assumed that Erica was nearby.

“Stiles!” Scott cheered, “You’re… wearing the exact same clothes.”

“Washed,” he said. “I was hostage for three days.”

“Happy Birthday,” Scott nodded in approval. His eyes flickering over Stiles’s face and then widening at the look of his neck. “How are you feeling?”

“I feel good,” he breathed with a grin. “Really good.”

“What the hell happened to your neck?” Nikodem roared.

Stiles tilted his head but as his father approached and began to touch, he felt the bruising on the base of his neck and the puncture wounds on his neck. He hissed and pulled away.

“Ow Dad! A little warning.”

“What happened to you?" Nikodem asked.

Stiles tried his best not to smile, “I… had a really good three days.”

“What the hell does that mean? You look like you got the shit beaten out of you!”

Scott winced, it was partially true. The bruises had spread, his cheeks were swelling too, red and darkening to purple from being slapped around. Scott wondered how Stiles was managing to move at all considering.

Stiles frowned and Erica offered a mirror with a sly grin, “You had one of those encounters did you now?”

“Many, many times,” he assured and felt himself blanch at the sight of himself.

It was far worse than he thought and he wondered if Gia and Pierce just hadn’t thought to tell him that he looked like a victim of a mauling, or if he really hadn’t looked that bad when he’d left them. Scratch marks dragging down his neck and multiple bite mark leading to the bruised flesh at the back of his neck. He took the mirror and lifted his shirt to quickly put it back down. Nikodem didn’t let him get away with it, tugging it back up to see the large purpling splotches around his hips, scratch and bite marks. Nikodem looked more and more disturbed as more and more of it was revealed. He looked at his Dad with a half smile and moved to get him into his office swearing that he would get Gia and Pierce for this awkward conversation.

“WHAT?!”

Erica burst into laughter at the sound and then quieted.

“What the hell were you thinking?!”

Stiles was sure that he’d get the cautious fearful father talk, but he didn’t think he’d get the irresponsible, disgraceful wiccan talk. He threw up a sound silencing barrier.

“You did what?”

“No chance of a happy birthday?” Stiles asked. “No congratulation for finally losing your virginity because I never thought you would, Stiles? Not even was it good?”

“Stiles have you any idea what kind of danger you’ve put yourself and your entire family in?”

His jaw clenched, his magic roared in his ears and his eyes narrowed at Nikodem. Nikodem’s eyes widened just a bit at the reaction, he’d never seen Stiles angry before. Not like this.

“Don’t.”

“You may not be a daughter, but are still a part of the bloodline! And a Wiccan! Are you insane? Are you that stupid that you didn’t even think about what could happen now?”

Stiles’s jaw twitched at the dig, “Of course--”

“Wasn’t once enough? Playing around with your ley lines when you know first hand how dangerous that can be--”

“I wasn’t playing around with anything!” Stiles growled. “And what the hell do you know about it anyway?”

“The hell you weren’t how else would anything possess you if you hadn't made yourself accessible-- who were these people you let tame you?”

He felt the dig a little harsher than usual. Maybe because Nikodem was blaming him for what happened. Was that what the council told him? Or the elders? Is that what he'd thought all this time?

Taming was something that was highly feared in the Wiccan community for a myriad of things. If you let another supernatural tame you, have control over you, you were considered not just a disgrace, but a danger to your family as all it took was one supernatural with the wrong intentions to ruin an entire Wiccan line. All Wiccans were taught from a young age how to fight against a taming, the dangers of it...

But no one ever talked about how good it could be to just have a bit of mental silence.

“Did they force you?”

“No, Dad. They didn’t.”

“How many, their species, names--”

“I’m not telling you that--”

“How am I supposed to believe that you let them tame you? Irresponsible as you are I thought you would at least respect your mother enough to know that it’s a bad idea, even beyond being a wiccan! There’s a reason why it doesn’t happen! We have to get you to Lenara to make sure you haven’t been...”

Don’t Stiles, but he felt the old feelings creeping up, roaring up and he felt the mask go up and it was drowning out Nikodem’s voice though absorbing every words like a magic ball to his chest.

“So on the scale of magical ineptitude to ADD, where are you placing this?”

He glared, “Don’t start with the snark, Stiles.”

He shrugged, “I just want to know where I stand in your eyes. Since this is the only time we ever really talk…. when you’re yelling at me.”

“We talked--”

“No,” he said shaking his head. “I talked to Mom.  We never talked even when I was here, when mom was alive. It was always yelling and scolding. I wrote you letters so you wouldn’t worry and every letter you sent back was be careful, don’t be stupid, don’t cause anyone trouble. I couldn't even tell you that I saved people's lives because you only see me as stupid fuck up Stiles!”

“You cause a lot of trouble, Stiles.”

“Yeah,” he said nodding, a wry smile on his lips. “I know I’m ruining your life.”

Nikodem swallowed, he didn’t think that Stiles had heard that...but apparently he had and before Nikodem could say anything, Stiles carried on. His deputies were probably hearing every word of this conversation.

“This stupid, immature, scatter brained kid who killed his mother has made his sole purpose in life to kill you too with shame and self-loathing.”

“Stiles--”

“I’m doing it on purpose. I plan on walking on Mom’s grave next.”

“Stiles,” Nikodem said, going pale.

“Destroying the jeep, maybe grafitti her statue too.”

“Are you possessed again?” Nikodem asked.

Stiles laughed, his head tossed back, his body shaking and shaking his head.

“For Merlin’s sake, you think I’m serious!” Stiles said shaking his head. “Is that what you think of me? Do you hate me that much you’ve made me a monster in your mind?”

Nikodem said nothing for a moment, “What?”

“I’m never going to be her daughter. Her line ends with pathetic, useless, stupid, fucked up me, because no matter what I do I shame you with every breath because I’m your son and heir to your subpar bloodline. And you hate it that I’m not just a reminder of your wiccan inability, but a reminder of her too. You hate me because I’m the reason she was injured when she left and you can’t understand why she would have saved me. You hate me because I will never be the daughter you dreamed of, the one that could make you proud--that would end your fucked up line.”

Stop Stiles,  a part of him said but it was all flowing out. All of it, streaming down his face, out his mouth, quick angry words let loose from the cage of self-doubt and angst had lifted from his shoulders. This was why wiccans didn't let vampyr feed on them, because they got really honest. In Stiles’s case, the emotional pain he hadn't  allowed himself to feel was surging and he felt it burning in his chest, his eyes.

“You hate me like this whole city hates me for driving her jeep, walking all over her name. And their all waiting for her daughter to show up and it burns you to know that there isn’t one! It’s just  worthless, useless, stupid me!”

“Stiles,” Nikodem started raising his hands in surrender. “This isn’t you… this is why wiccans don’t let--”

“This is me,” Stiles said softly. “Being honest. I don’t want to hear shit from a man who is ashamed of me!”

His blood was roaring in his ears and he could feel his magic roiling, tangling with everything that had been smothered underneath the layers of doubt and terror. How afraid he’d been in Eichen House, how afraid he’d been in the explosion, how hard he prayed for Claudia to come home. He’d been a kid at school for Merlin’s sake. She’d saved him because she loved him...She’d saved Beacon Hills because she loved it. And no matter how many times he’d tried to show or tell his Dad that he had magic, that he could make him proud, Nikodem had never listened, never seen… always assumed that it was Scott, that Stiles had done something wrong, playing a trick. He’d blocked it out until eventually Stiles just stopped trying, stopped talking, stopped saying the things that needed to be said between them.

“I’m done,” he said finally and turned towards the door and walked out, Nikodem on his heels and he went to Scott.

“Give me the keys.”

His eyes wanted to say something but he handed them over without a word and turned towards the line of people there to file a complaint. The woman in front turned to him with a sneer.

“You, how dare you--”

He threw the keys at her face with a sick satisfaction as the stuck in her mouth. The line gawked at him and he just glared back before looking at Nikodem, “There’s the resolution of your civil complaints.”

He left then and walked out the station, wiping his face furiously. His magic boiling at his fingertips, his ley lines rioting feeling like dragon fire and pixie dust, wanting to explode with the utter freedom that saying that had given him. It wasn’t all of what he wanted to say, but it was enough for now.

"Stiles!" Nikodem yelled after him but Stiles had no interest in listening.

He took a solid jump into the air, flexed his ley lines and let the winds carry him, tossing a perception spell over his shoulder. Nikodem stood frozen outside the station, his mouth agape and looking to the spot Stiles had been not a moment before and now was not. He didn't hear any running footsteps which meant he hadn't run off on foot…. How could he have disappeared like that?

Scott came out next and cursed, "Damn it now he'll be almost impossible to find."

"Scott," he started. "When did Stiles learn to disappear like that?"

Scott winced, "Sheriff... I think we should talk."

***

Stiles landed in his old bedroom and summoned his traveling bag and all his new clothing before floating to stand in front of the house and holding his hand out, opening his ley lines and breathing. When he reached out with his magic to the magic he’d weved into the house he tugged, but it wouldn’t budge.

Toddler, kid, child, pre-teen, teenager Stiles all lined up in front of the living room window, refusing to be moved. Scared of leaving his father alone, unwilling to leave the place his mother loved so dearly. Afraid and self-loathing. He didn’t deserve to leave. He’d killed her.

"I'm leaving," he said. "And I can't  leave you all here this time."

Can't or won't?

But Mom loved it here.

Mom will come back and it’ll be okay.

I killed her, let me serve my sentence.

He'd cloaked his flying from the police station, he knew Nikodem saw him vanish and his cop mind would realize t. It didn't matter. He felt his jaw trembled and shook his head at the latent feelings, feelings he’d forgotten and buried so deep that they were like fresh wounds hearing them now.

"It was stupid to leave you here before, stupid to think he'd ever understand. I can't leave you here again!"

Can't or won't.

Son of a bitch he let his hand fall and felt his knees give out as he crumbled on the lawn in front of his house and cried, screaming as tears streamed down his face, his arms wrapped around himself as he pulled his knees to his chest and rocked, sobbing on the lawn.

The ghosts of himself before came closer to him, stayed with him as he sobbed. He wasn’t sure how long it was before there was a presence behind him, a touch to his shoulder and migraine in his head.

It was Melissa. He sniffled looking up at her, knowing his face was probably splotchy and wet, but he couldn’t see to care. Her eyes softed as she kneeled beside him, an arm around his shoulder as their eyes met. The deluge of raw emotions roiled in his chest and seeped quietly from his eyes as he hiccupped and sniffled.

"How about curly fries? My treat."

He nodded slowly and wiped his face. When he stood up and turned to go, the front door to the house flew in and a thick cloud of magic came pouring out and into Stiles. Melissa jumped back at the surge as it surrounded and sunk into his skin. The wounds healed and he felt the pit of emotions filling up with the familiar angst, doubt, mourning, and rage. All the wishes of his childhood, the memories of growing up, and the desperate want to be seen for who he was… everything that had been released and realized from his three days with Gia and Pierce, there again, different and heavier in high definition quality. All fresh pain from old wounds. Melissa got him into her car and drove towards Beacon Fries. He left his bag in the car and took the seat across from her.

Melissa ordered for the both of them, all his favorites and hers as he dismantled his phone and set it aside.

"Scott called you?"

Melissa shook her head, "One of the doctors came in, the really prissy one who I hate, saying that you had thrown the keys to the jeep in her mouth at the station. I knew something was wrong."

"You got off early."

"Worked a double, I was due to clock out."

Stiles nodded.

Melissa smile, "When I called, Scott said you two argued."

Stiles snorted, "There's no arguing with the Sheriff... just being yelled at or yelling."

Melissa nodded, the man was classically stubborn and hadn't  quite ever learned Stiles the way he should have. Grief had taken its toll on Nikodem long before Claudia had died.

"You still can't leave Beacon Hills no matter how bad it is."

"I gave up the jeep."

Melissa shrugged, "I'm pretty sure that won't  last long."

"There's nothing left to say," he said and Melissa snorted.

"You? Speechless?"

Stiles sighed, and the waiter set their food and shakes in front of them.

"What happened?"

Stiles sighed and began with pack night out...


	8. Straight from the Source

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Truths come to life and Derek is starting to hate rules even more than usual

Nikodem shuffled home that night in half a daze. He placed his hand on the doorknob to turn to find it... locked?

Locked? He frowned and tried to turn the knob again, finding it still locked.

An uneasy feeling settled over him. The same uneasy and hollow feeling he’d had when Claudia had left to pick Stiles up from school… the same feeling he’d had when Stiles had left three years ago. The door always unlocked itself when he came home. Even after Stiles left, it had done so making him think that maybe Claudia had not left them entirely, that he wasn’t alone in the house of memories.  He fished out his keys not even remembering if he had a set and found them. Unlocking the door, he winced at the squeak of the door.

The door had never squeaked before. The floorboards had never creaked before. And since when did the house lose its scent of freshly cleaned? Nikodem poured himself a tumble of Jack Daniel and collapsed with groan onto the living room couch to stare up at their family picture. Beneath it, the staff had withered even further and looked like a gnarly piece of dead bark, the crystal it housed was dim. It was never dim. He remembered when Stiles would sleep in the living room because he said it felt like his mom was there if he was near it. While Stiles was gone, he learned that Stiles was right…. but not now.

She didn’t feel there now. The house felt cold and empty in a way that it never had before.

"Claudia," he said to the empty air. "What the hell is going on?"

There of course was no answer and a strange feeling to the couch. For one it felt its age, he should have thrown the couch out years ago, but it had always been comfortable. What about it had changed today? With his luck, Claudia was punishing him.

But it wasn't just the couch it was the whole house that had lost something, he wasn't  entirely  sure what it was but he could feel it. It wasn't the house's magic but something else. Something deeper, steadier, more heart shattering now that it was gone. It felt like a mausoleum now.

The washer machine wasn't washing clothes and when he undressed for the night there wasn't  the sound of rustling clothing slithering towards the laundry room. The dishes from dinner were still in the sink. It only took that for him to know that something was terribly wrong… of course the busted pipe definitely helped. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d gotten any maintenance done on the house that wasn’t a little paint there, a little wrench work here. He knew Stiles had probably gone to spend the night with Scott at least for the night and they would hash it out the next day. So he went to sleep, shivering as even the flowers on his bedside table seemed to wilt.

But Stiles didn’t come home the next day.

Or the next week and that eerie haunted feeling only grew stronger.

“Stiles?! Stiles?!” He called through the house when he came home the next day. Stiles wasn’t there though. His room had been emptied. His old clothes gone, his new clothes gone, the bed made… He hadn’t been there for weeks…

Had he gone abroad again? Where was he staying? Had he been hurt? It took three weeks for him to get an answer in the form of Lenara at his door. When he opened it, she was touching the door’s frame and wincing. A red mustang that had to be at least as old as the jeep sat quietly with blacked out windows at the edge of the driveway. She let let out a low whistle.

"He really let you have it, huh?"

Nikodem frowned as she came in wincing at the pile of dishes in the sink and the general state of the house. It had always been immaculate, but now in the span of just a few weeks, the house seemed to be losing its sense of order as Nikodem seemed to be losing his mind. She took a seat at the table almost wincing at the state of Nikodem himself. Harried, terrified, worried, and still so stubborn.

“You know where he is?”

"I'm staging an intervention so Stiles stays in Beacon Hills."

Nikodem shook his head and sat down, "I don't know what to think Lenara."

Lenara watched him sigh and sit back in his chair.

"Who is it that came back from over there? That he would go and--"

Lenara held up a hand, "What you're  about to say is the reason that all the enchantments that made your life easier are gone."

"What are you talking about?"

"The dishes, your clothes, the cleaning the maintenance, everything else... you never wondered  why it all just took care of itself? You never wondered how?"

"Claudia--"

"Stiles," she said.

Nikodem frowned, what did Stiles have to do with anything? Besides the fact that he hasn't picked up the phone and no one will tell him where he's gone and he’s been gone for weeks. With any luck the vampyr wasn’t turning his son into a blood and sex puppet.

"Stiles weaved most of those spells into the house when he was a kid."

"That's impossible."

"Not to be corny, but impossible is that kid's middle name."

He snorted and shook his head, "I don't understand."

"Because you never listened," Lenara said. "You did the best you could after Claudia died, but before then when she was still alive, you weren't there for him the way he needed you to be."

"I was there--"

"Who was Stiles’s first crush?"

Nikodem frowned, he didn't know. He thought it was Scott considering how much the two spent together. He didn’t remember Stiles ever talking about girls… or guys.

"Who was he planning to ask to prom? His favorite color? The first spell he ever cast? How did he get possessed? I could go on."

Nikodem remained quiet…He knew that the possession had to have been a result of Stiles playing with power that he didn’t understand, messing with his ley lines. At least, that’s what the Wiccan Elders had told him. But the thought that Stiles could have magic in the same way that Claudia had magic was impossible. Wiccan powers only followed the gender bloodlines and the Stilinskis had not had magic of any real quality since the time of Merlin.

"Are you ready to listen?"

"To what?"

"To your son, just know that if you can't  I don't  doubt that Stiles will leave permanently."

Nikodem breathed and bit his lip. Wiccan elders would be angry with him, it made no sense but he nodded. She nodded and picked up her phone.

"Bring him in," she said and the door opened with Dasha pulling Stiles along.

"Don't make me druid you!"

She forced him into the chair, the injuries he'd  sustained from the taming were gone, which considering the extent of them that should have been impossible. Dasha took a seat beside Lenara but Stiles didn't  say anything, just looking at Nikodem.

"Stiles," Lenara started. "Tell him the truth."

Nikodem wondered what exactly the truth could be, but his cop’s eyes were prepared for the joke that was going to pulled. But Lenara and Dasha were completely serious and Stiles’s jaw trembled. His eyes were pained and flickering across the room, trying to find anything to look at but Nikodem. His eyes narrowed and he waited, only partly aware of Lenara and Dasha sitting not too far away from them.

“Stiles,” Lenara said gently. “Tell him.”

Stiles bit his lip and breathed out, closing his eyes and shaking head, “What difference will it make?”

He moved get up and it’s Nikodem that stops him, a hand grabbing his arm, “Sit.”

Stiles looked at him and Nikodem can see the defiance, the latent anger, the still roiling feelings from earlier in his whiskey colored eyes, but Stiles relents and sits down again.

“Tell me what? What truth?”

“I… I have magic, Dad.”

Nikodem gave him a look, “You’re Wiccan, Stiles. Of course you have magic.”

He shook his head and looked at Lenara. She only nodded. He bit his lip and breathed a forced breath before turning his eyes back to his father, “I have magic… like Mom had magic.”

Nikodem’s brow furrowed, “What exactly did you do while overseas?”

His jaw tensed and Stiles surged to his feet, “Why did I have to do something for it to be true? Why can’t you just listen to what I have to say?”

“Because you’re my son and there’s no way you can have that kind of magic. There hasn’t be that sort of magic in the Stilinski family since the times or Merlin and even then we weren’t that powerful.”

Stiles shook his head. While that was true, it had nothing to do with the magical maelstrom that Stiles had apparently inherited from Claudia. Stiles shook his head, the roiling feelings creeping up and invading him. All the years of longing rushing through him, he’d been with Gia and Pierce to get help, but it had been too much. Stiles knew that, Pierce knew that and had stopped Gia before she strung herself out or maybe killed Stiles. They weren’t sure which it would be. It hadn’t made a dent considering she didn’t even get a taste

“So what did you do?”

“I didn’t do anything and this is a waste of time,” he looked at Lenara. “Let me leave.”

Dasha shook her head, “Nope. You haven’t told him yet.”

“Tell me what?”

“I have magic, that doesn’t count?”

Dasha shook her head, “Does it look like it counts?”

Stiles looked at Nikodem whose arms were crossed as he looked at Stiles. Wind moved across Stiles’s shoulders, he felt his mother’s hands on his shoulders forcing him to sit down again. Watching his father’s face, he knew that Nikodem couldn’t sense it at all, couldn’t sense her presence.

Show him.

He held out his hand then and Nikodem looked at it, “Give me your hand, Dad.”

Nikodem placed his hand in Stiles in a moment, he felt the surge across his senses, his eyes open to the nearly invisible figure standing beside Stiles’s chair. It smiled at him, the planes of its face so familiar…

Claudia….

Nikodem took his hand back and gaped at Stiles, “What have you done Stiles?”

“She died when she raised the barrier and became a spirit of the wind,” Stiles told him. “She’s been watching over me while I was overseas… and when I was here… and you.”

Nikodem tried to wrap his head around it, how could he not have known that and why was Stiles taking just now to tell him this?

“You’re a medium?” Nikodem ventured.

“I’m a wiccan,” Stiles said and dug in his pocket with a sigh. “When I was a kid, I wanted to make her proud… to make you proud, but it was hard to do that when all you saw was an inattentive kid...a troublemaking teenager…”

He pulled out a small pouch and began to pull things out of it: pictures, letters, his passports that had been stamped to death and other random magical artifacts that belonged with elder wiccans and the like.

“These are things I earned, were given to me, and the like while I was overseas traveling with Uncle G and the others.”

Nikodem’s eyes narrowed, “You never said you were traveling with them!”

“Because you would look at me just like you’re looking at me right now! Won’t you even look at all the good I’ve done before you get upset?”

Nikodem glared at him, lifting the first letter to read it’s sprawling handwriting and the picture enclosed. It was from a little girl in India, he was pretty sure that he didn’t read Hindi, but given the oddly shimmering appearance of the words, he assumed that someone was casting a translation spell.

She was thanking him for saving her father and vanquishing the spirits that were haunting their settlement in the Hostiles. As he read through the rest, they were many of the same thing: thank yous. Thanks for saving them, for killing a dragon, for finding a family treasure, for defending their borders. Well wishes and good luck all addressed to his son, Stiles. Pictures of his son capturing dragon fire in his hands and lightning bolts in a blood red cloak unmarked by any crest, but was definitely Hieronim red. A few were embossed with the seals of territories overseas, one from Warsaw and a few others that he didn’t recognize.

“Seems like… you were busy.”

“All the time,” Stiles said with a grin.

“Show me,” Nikodem said, setting the letters down. “ You have my attention now Stiles. Show me this magic of yours.”

Stiles felt his heart flutter, he’d never performed overt magic in front of his father before. He glanced to Lenara who only smiled and nodded before he stood up and backed up a few paces. Stiles closed his eyes and made himself relax. Usually, Nikodem couldn’t see the flow of magic unless it was extremely concentrated, which meant either Stiles’s spell was still active or maybe it was just that concentrated, because it was coming off him in waves of thick blue bolts and drops falling to the ground, striking out across the house and filling it. He felt the shift in the air as it began to seep back into the house. He heard the washer machine, the dryer, the dishes in the sink and felt it filling the house, wrapping around him as a warmth to knock the eerie chill away. It felt like it did before their argument.

Stiles’s eyes glowed a bright amber as it rushed around the house and a small whirlwind settled beside him, gaining form and glowing until Claudia Hieronim was standing there beside him in her emissary cloak, a ghostly, wispy echo of herself smiling at him. Her hair was as short as it always was, spiked on her head and a little wind swept.

Niko…

He felt his heart lurch hearing her voice in his head.

“How are you doing that?” Nikodem managed around the lump in his throat, but Stiles did not answer, his eyes open and glowing white now, apparently in a trance.

She took a seat and Lenara and Dasha watched in amazement as she smiled across the table.

He could not find the words… he felt that you would listen to me...

“Claudia… what…?”

I thought you understood… but I can see that I was wrong. Joachim has always had great power, ever since he was a child. I had him weave spells into the house to help him control his magic that was growing faster than his body could. The jeep, the dishes, your car that never dies Niko… your clothes are all imbued with that magic, protective charms and the like…

“Why didn’t he ever tell me? Why didn’t you ever tell me? How is this possible?”

She laughed, The Elders are old fools, Nikodem… magic is not so easily understood as bloodlines. I told you several times, but you were so set in your belief in the Elders, between them and your grief… you wouldn’t listen… I split my life so Stiles, and ultimately you, would be safe until he could come into his own.

“How…”

Communing with spirits was one thing but giving them voice and form…?

He is amazing though he does not realize it yet.

She smiled and reached for his hand. He felt it like a warm caress of air on his skin, Listen to him, Nikodem… for Stiles, for Joachim,... for me. Please?

He nodded and she smiled and nodded, I love you, Niko.

“I… love you, Claudia…”

The tears started then, hot and angry down his face as the magic died down and Claudia’s form drifted away on the wind that caressed his cheek and Stiles’s eyes faded back to an alert brown. He looked at his father who was shaking his head and wiping his face, sobbing softly, his hands gripped tightly.

“I’m… so sorry, Stiles…”

Stiles takes a breath and looks to Lenara and Dasha who are getting up to leave. When the door closes behind them, it takes a while for Nikodem to take a breath and a little longer for Stiles to tell him the truth about the Nogitsune. The reason why he left, the Counsel’s part to play in the whole affair… the possession. The life that Stiles led when Nikodem thought he was watching... When it’s all over, Nikodem feels his heart tighten with grief for the years he’d lost with his son and stares at Stiles with an odd fascination.

“Dad?”

He shakes his head, “I’m… so proud of you.”

Relief washes over him and he felt himself breathe, the emotions that had colored his magic faded with it and he nodded. Stiles made Claudia’s trademark meatloaf and potatoes and Nikodem conceded to a salad. They sat at the dining table and Stiles answered every question Nikodem could come up with. It’s an odd feeling being on the other side of an interrogation that wasn’t geared towards making him feel bad. He asked all questions that Stiles expected and some that he didn’t. It goes on like that for a few days, with Nikodem asking, trying to fill in the gaps in his mind, before Nikodem returns the keys to the jeep to him.

“Go collect the jeep before it destroys the museum.”

Stiles nods and heads that way on a gust of wind, stepping into perception in the empty hallway and hearing the sound of the jeep’s engine revving and the sound of spells being cast. Basic containment and exorcism spells it sounded like.

“I don’t understand!”

He stepped into the hall and shook his head, “She doesn’t want to be a museum piece.”

The jeep’s engine quieted to a pur as it rolled towards Stiles who looked at the director of the museum. An older man that only sneered at his unkempt state. If Stiles had to guess, he was still upset about the time he, as a Claudia Hieronim’s daughter had told him exactly how many pieces in the museum were fake. Of course, the man didn't know that he was that kid, but he knew that the man had probably never recovered and took it out on everyone. His current issue was probably the fact that he was the Sheriff's fucked up kid telling him that the jeep wouldn't ever stay put no matter how many spells they cast.

“What would you know about Emissary Hieronim’s jeep?”

“Well,” he said with a smile. “Since she signed it over to me and it’s my name on the title, I happen to know a lot about it. She isn’t a museum piece, she’s a fighter.”

The jeep honks in agreement and Stiles smiles charmingly and offers a solution, “You want to preserve her significance to Beacon Hills and keep your museum in tact. I’d like my car to be happy. How about a compromise?”

The director frowns, “A compromise?”

He nodded, “The jeep is self-sufficient. No gas, no maintenance, no driver really. Hell, no keys really needed either. I keep ownership of the jeep and offer up the jeep for specialty tours of Beacon Hills.”

He frowned, “Tours?”

He nodded, “Tours around the Beacon Hills Territory. I’m pretty sure she’ll be agreeable to carting a few curious people around the territory for a few hours. She likes people.”

“She?”

“The jeep is a she.”

He lifted his nose, “I will discuss it with the directors.”

Stiles nodded, “You do that. Ring the station when you do, they know how to reach me. In the meantime, may I suggest you open the warehouse doors before she rams a hole through the building?”

They did as he asked and the jeep trucked primly out the door to meet Stiles in front of the museum. The director stood at the entrance as Stiles shook his head at the jeep.

“Throwing a tantrum? Aren’t you a bit too old for that?”

The headlights flash and Stiles chuckles as the door opens, “I’m sorry too. How about ice cream?”

The headlights flashed again as he climbed into the driver’s seat. The seatbelt buckled around his waist and the jeep headed down the street. Stiles watched the streets pass by including the woman that he’d thrown the keys at who’d only gawked at him.

“You can file another civil complaint if you’d like,” he said. “But I can’t tell you if she’ll appreciate it.”

“She?”

“The jeep, she doesn’t like you.”

“You a stupid hoe-you a-- you a-- stupid hoe…”

Her jaw dropped as Stiles laughed and shook his head, “That’s not very nice.”

The jeep continued on as Stiles watched her disappear. This time they drove straight out of the boundary and Stiles didn’t know where they were going, but it was into the Hostiles and that was fine with him. They stopped to visit a few groups on the way to Texas before stopping in Brenham for ice cream and beginning  the trek home.

***

A few weeks pass with relative peace and before Stiles realized it he’d been back in Beacon Hills for a few months. He’d gotten a  job mopping the floor and cleaning windows at a specialty store for wiccans, at the library as a paige, at the police station for whatever magical thing his father was facing. The last was sort of accidental. He’d been delivering lunch to the Sheriff and walked into the debrief room telling him he needed to take his medication and eat something that wasn’t a doughnut “And don’t think I don’t know about them”. The deputies laughed, but one glance at the board and Stiles winced.

“What?” Nikodem asked taking the lunch from him. “What is that face for?”

“It’s… a leviathan.”

They all glanced at the board and then to him, “How can you tell?”

“The remains mostly… and the black ooze…”

“We were wondering what that was.”

Stiles shrugged, “This one’s probably really young. Definitely hungry.”

It had turned out that Stiles was absolutely correct and the culprit was a baby leviathan that had wandered away from his family in the Hostiles and into Beacon Hills. Being that no one really had any experience with the Hostile or Leviathans, Stiles was tasked with returning him to where he belonged...only to find that a member of the Hoard had been one of the many people liberated from the O’Brien Pack and had spread his name around the camp.

They had a request of him and being that his jobs were less than magically demanding, he took it on, becoming a temporary ambassador between their Hoard and a nearby Pack. They wanted to join the settlement peacefully insisting that there was strength in numbers. Their leader had been killed while they’d escaped their original territory and most of the caravan was children of different races including lycan foundlings. Stiles was sure that he’d be able to help.

The Alpha of the pack had taken one look at Stiles and had been overjoyed.

“You’re Claudia’s son!” He said crossing the tent to hug him tightly. “She told me so much about you, come in! Don’t be a stranger.”

He wasn’t entirely surprised that this alpha knew his mother, but was surprised that the other said “son” not “daughter”.

“You look just like her, what has brought you into my territory?”

Stiles explained the situation and the fact that they wanted passage before leading him, and a few of his betas, to where they were hiding out, between the pack’s territory and Beacon Hills. It had been an instant attraction between the lycan woman reading to children and the alpha, and seeing the state of the caravan he was more than willing to allow them sanctuary.

When Stiles arrived home, he told his father about it only to receive a wary look about Stiles being alone in the hostiles.

“That’s dangerous.”

“They knew mom,” he said. “Like they had tea on Sundays or something.”

That had piqued the man’s interest.

“Still dangerous,” he said. “But I’m listening.”

He grinned and told him about the  caravan, leaving the the more dangerous parts of trapping a baby leviathan. He knows that his father is having an near heart attack on the inside, but he says nothing, hugs him and tells him to stay safe.

The odd peace in Beacon Hills lasts for a little longer. Scott accompanies Derek to a lycan meeting and meets several lycans that he’s tricked in the past. Luckily, they had a good humor about it. Kira was off to speak to a group of Kitsune who wanted safe passage into Beacon Hills. Then there was the pixie meeting. All of these exploits ended up beginning in Stiles’s bedroom with “Bro! I need help! What’s a [insert diplomatic term]?”.

The emissary, Aurora, was taking up Druid lessons again and Stiles thought for sure that everything would begin to get better.

That was until he phone was ringing at an ungodly hour. He groaned reaching for the phone.

“Hello.”

“Stiles, efilδe a’δ gavar!1”

Stiles frowned at the huffing lycan in his ears, it sounded like Derek. “Derek?”

“Efilδe, Stiles. 2”

He sat up and took a deep breathe, “Gavar lo? 3”

Derek ran, all fours, half shift if only to keep up with the group flying above him and the small caravan ahead. From the ground it was obvious that they were draco, half shift with glowing eyes and roaring fire, draco magic striking out as they were chased. Shouting loud angry words of powers. He heard the crying of a baby as the woman dodged through the air.

“What is it?” Stiles asks calmly. “What’s the problem?”

“Two caravans fighting, chasing one through the sky. I need to know if I can intervene.”

“How near to Beacon Hills are you? Where are you?”

“Maybe fifty miles South, at the rate they’re flying, they’re headed straight for the barrier.”

“Draco?”

“Yes.”

“Do you see anything that could tell you where they’re from, who they are? What do they smell like?”

“I don’t know, there’s a lot of magic floating--fire.”

“Color, I need colors, Derek.”

“The woman and man being chased they have blue and black scales, the ones chasing them have blue.”

“Who has blue scales the man or the woman? Who is fighting?”

“The woman is covering the rear, the man is flying ahead with the baby. The woman has blue.”

Stiles felt his stomach roll as he got out of bed and moved to grab his keys, running down the steps. The jeep was already on and ready to roll when he got in and it tore out of the driveway. He shot a quick spirit message to stick to the front door as the jeep rolled down the street.

“Baby?  Or an egg?”

“A baby, definitely a baby.”

“How old?”

“I don’t know! An infant, why is this important?”

“Because she may crash--”

All at once it happened, the woman cried out, screaming and fell from the sky. The man turned back screaming for her, diving down through the barrage of fire and casting a large net of darkness over the area.

“She fell.”

“Listen very carefully Derek, that baby is a newborn. I’d say a few hours old, a shifter. The men that are chasing them are from a blue dragon clan and they are chasing her and that man more than likely because they’ve had a mixed scale kid.”

“That’s… bad?”

“Bad in the eyes of blue dragons yes… especially with a black dragon. You have one of two options. I’m on my way, you have to stall them for as long as possible, get them as close to the barrier as you can.”

“What do I do?”

“Get close enough to them and I’ll tell you what to say.”

When he landed, he found her struggling to her feet, coughing up a dark liquid. They had not run fast enough, she’d been hit and he did not have the ability to heal her. They could have made it to Beacon Hills had they not been betrayed. he shook his head, glancing at the bundle in his arms--they would make it to Beacon Hills.

“Come, love, stand… I have you…”

She shook her head, falling to her knees again, “Go. Take her. I will not make it.”

“Give me your hand!” He said, taking her hand and wrapping an arm around her waist, helping her to walk out of the clearing.

“The spell will break soon...Leave me.”

“No,” he told her.

She pushed at his shoulder, “Don’t be a--”

Her mouth opened, black goo shooting forth and staining the ground. His stomach turned as his eyes found the dark veins growing up her neck.

“They’ve poisoned me,” she said softly. “Go.”

He stared in horror, shaking his head, “Hold on, for us. Please. The barrier isn’t far.”

She shook her head, “There is no time.”

Derek heard them, staying as far back as possible without being sensed. The tree exploded into hot black fire and made him dart from behind the tree. The man was on him in seconds, standing above him, a ball of cold black fire in his hand, his eyes alight, roaring angry words at him. His voice was thick with rage and even if he could speak Draco he was sure that it would be hard to make out around the fierce protectiveness in the set of his jaw. Derek swallowed, suppressing his instinct to leap forward and attack the man. He breathed and waited for Stiles to give him some sort of direction.

"Raise your hand and retract your claws, press it over your heart, just the tips of your fingers and repeat after me."

Derek did as he was told meeting the man’s eyes. The hand full of fire lowered, his brow furrowed and he watched Derek with a wary eye. The baby in his arms squirmed a little to lay her bright eyes on him.

“Ju’tak lo gva hav-or,” Stiles said and Derek repeated. “Ju‘Alpha Hale in al Beacon Hills.4”

The fire vanished and the man stepped back, “Alpha Hale, ju--5”

The baby wailed as the dark sky broke open to the true sky and the men in uniform, blue scaled and sneering, descended from above the tree line. The woman drags herself forward, raising her hand in rage and the man curls protectively around the child in his arms.

“Stiles,” he said. “The pursuers are here.”

“I’m on my way, just repeat after me. Ju’Alpha Hale in al Beacon Hills, Tak ki?6”

“Ju’Alpha Hale in al Beacon Hills,” Derek says to the approaching figures. “Tak ki?”

“Step aside, lycan,” the one with white scales said looking at the figures on the ground. The rough english grates his ears, but at least he doesn’t need Stiles to translate it. The woman barely hanging on to life, gathering magic in the palm of her hand to throw it at them. “You are no one outside of your territory.”

He feels the sting to his pride but Stiles is talking again, telling him something, what to say and Derek can hear the engine of the jeep  bumping through the night to reach there. It’s about his rights as alpha, rights they as members of the enforcing class of their territory have to respect.

“You are no one outside your territory as well,” Derek said, glancing at their uniforms. “As the one closest to my territory it’s my right to know the goings on around it. That being said: state your purpose.”

The man sneers, “They’ve broken the laws of our territory, our Clan Head would have the woman killed and that abomination of a child as well.”

“On what grounds?”

“Miscegenation with a Jo-karlo.7”

It’s the woman who reacts--a roar and a struggle to stand even through her poison haze. He knows the rage and pain in her eyes, she means to kill them with her last breath, to defend until the last, until this man and baby were safe.

Stiles speaks again and Derek can only smile, “Did they petition to leave?”

“No.”

“Rioþ!” She yelled coughing, “Tak valna jil ovna marlkov nat!8”

“Gorþi, Jo!9”

It’s the man that roars next drawing black fire and Derek lifts his hands up and stands between them, effectively halting the exchange of blows.

“If they have petitioned to leave and you have denied them, you have to have reason.”

“She is the daughter of the high priest,” the lieutenant said glaring at the woman glaring back at him. “Set to be the next High Priestess of our territory.”

“Ju’Nola--10”

“Yet she has defiled your body with this unholy beast--”

“Ha’tak nav leof hav il nal On diþ gok!11”

The man started moved towards her, the baby wailed and Derek was about to speak when the bright blue jeep rolled through the tree line and out stepped a figure, Derek knew it was Stiles, but somehow he couldn’t explain why it couldn’t be Stiles. For one, the bright red cloak and hood , the multicolored chain that kept it closed together and the fact that the other was a force of nature. Power ebbed from his form, but it wasn’t of the magical variety. There was something in the figure’s stance and presence that made Derek regard him with respect. This was a man who’d been through hell and survived it.  He walked around the edge of the car and went to the woman on the ground. For two, it doesn’t sound like Stiles either. There’s an infinite grace in the other’s footsteps, an impossible lightness that is neither shifter nor ghostly, but natural as if he is one with the world and does not disturb a single thing when he treads upon the ground.

“Ju’Wicca-milo, hilko tak ju’nava.12”

She only stares up into the dark hood as his hands, glowing with thick clouds of magic stroke over her skin. The man watches on in awe, breathless, the baby staring into the swirling vortex as well. While they seemed pacified, Derek watched the two men that were prepared to attack. The baby girl had beautiful midnight blue scales, a perfect balance between her parents and sweet innocent, worried eyes.

“Tav na, jy’ha nahilk.13” 

The figure who Derek was sure had to be Stiles stood then, “Get into the jeep.”

The man did as he was told as the figure advanced to stand beside Derek.

“In the name of the Ancient Draco Pact and the Rites of Hieronim of 2194, they have been granted asylum by Alpha Derek Hale of Beacon Hills. Should you have a complaint or wish to sue, send your emissary to file a formal complaint in three days time.Y”

Derek can’t help but wonder what exactly Stiles is talking about and how he knows it, but the two glare at him and then at Derek.

“Our head will hear of this,” they hiss but take off into the sky.

Derek turns to the figure as the two are far enough away.

“Coming?” he asks from the depths of his hood.

Derek follows him to climb into the passenger seat of the jeep. When they’re buckled in, the jeep starts up and Stiles pulls the hood from his head to look back at the three. The baby is curled up in her mother’s arms and the two of them are leaning together.

“How did you do that?’ Derek asked. “What are the Rites of Hieronim? A suit?”

Stiles groaned and rubbed his eyes, “I was training to be an emissary before everything went to hell... “

What? He’d been stuck with Aurora all this time when Stiles was in Beacon Hills and more than qualified to help with all the insanity that had been going on. If he didn’t like the Counsel before, he sure as hell didn’t like them now.

“I thought you didn’t have magic… and what exactly did you just do?”

He smiled, “The Rites of Heironim are an old pact between the Wiccans and the dragons across all territories, named so because the Hieronim family made it happen. It’s been added to every territories law and made a part of dragon dogmatic law as well. As for the magic, even low level Wiccans like my father can perform healing magic.”

There was a sound from the back seat, but Derek’s eyes narrowed. Healing magic was one thing, but healing that sort of wound, he was sure, was another… Not to mention that Stiles didn’t actually confirm or deny his ability to perform magic above the “low level Wiccan” abilities, whatever those were. He was also pretty sure that Nikodem couldn’t, or maybe wouldn’t, perform any sort of magic for any reason, ever.

Derek somehow isn’t satisfied with that answer, but as the barrier draws nearer and they truck through the sleeping city, Derek drops it. They go to the hospital to get the three into care. Melissa takes charge of getting the woman into the emergency room and getting the baby looked over. The girl giggles and wiggles throughout the inspection and the man does his best to project calm, though he can’t seem to stop glancing at the emergency room doors and fiddling with the baby’s blanket.

It’s an hour before the woman wakes up frantic and defensive in the circle of doctors who speak only English. She yells and struggles against them, pulling at the electrodes that are monitoring her heart rhythms and screaming in loud angry Draco on the edge of tears and attack.

Stiles steps in as the draco translator is not around to tell her that she is in Beacon Hills, she is safe, her husband and child are in the next room being checked over and she needs rest.

“Cgrisas, hav-or ji.14“Easy, they will come.

When Stiles gets the woman to calm down and answers all of her questions, Derek drags him away and out the door. Stiles expects a barrage of questions, he doesn’t expect what Derek says.

“You speak Draco.”

“Was that a question or a statement?”

“Both, and lycan?”

“Fluent enough to understand you even when half asleep. What would you have done if I didn’t speak it?”

“What do you mean?”

“You called and yelled at me in lycan…. you were that panicked.”

Derek flushed a bit and looked away. He’d heard the cries of pain and the baby’s wails of fear. He’d smelt fear and desperation on the wind and all of his alpha instincts had roared to the surface. It had not been himself speaking, but he and his wolf together… How rare. He guessed he was settling into this alpha gig a little better than he first thought.

“Will they be alright?” Derek asked next and Stiles nodded.

“They will be fine. I’ll stay and translate until the official translator comes. They need rest and a place to stay before you start asking questions.”

Derek nodded listening to Stiles explain what would probably happen next and jotting down notes for Derek to keep until morning when he had gotten a few more answers from the couple. For now, Derek was to go home as Stiles had it all handled. He went home with an odd sense of ease and in the morning he asked Scott everything he could think of regarding Stiles’s education before heading to the police station to try and get access to Stiles’s records. The records came easy and true to form, “Stiles” didn’t appear anywhere in the system, but he assumed that “Joachim” was probably Stiles’s real name even if he didn’t know how to pronounce it. Even Scott didn’t know how to pronounce his real first name and Nikodem seemed unwilling to say it. The file he was given had “Stilinski” written on it from the school records. Stiles had in fact been studying to be an emissary up until the end of high school. He’d graduated at the top of his class, but rather than go to an academy, he went overseas for three years.

The why of it all, he never found and had a feeling that he’d have to ask Stiles personally. Even f Scott and Kira knew, and that was the reason for the block on their school records, neither of them would divulge anything to him. As frustrating as it was to be second best to their loyalty to Stiles, he appreciated it. It meant at the very least they would be half as loyal to him.

“I told you that Stiles is awesome.” Scott said with a grin. “He’s the greatest thing and if I were an Alpha I’d hire him.”

Normally, Derek would agree. Hell, he did agree. The only problem was that Stiles was on the Counsel’s “Do Not Sign” List meaning he couldn’t even request Stiles to be tested to be eligible for the Emissary position… that and Aurora still held the position rightfully as it was bestowed by the counsel meant that Stiles becoming the Emissary of Beacon Hills was almost an impossible dream.

“Being an alpha is fucking harder than it needs to be,” Derek grumbled looking through the Council's rules on Emissarial representatives with no luck for an answer.

The explanations of the “Do Not Sign” List were vague, convoluted, and mostly non-existent making drawing up any sort of suit to get Stiles off the list impossible. Somehow, Derek thought that the council had done it on purpose. It was a problem they would have to overcome later.

The couple was well rested by the end of the next day and Stiles handed him a stack of notes for his case to keep them in Beacon Hills and grant them Sanctuary. He wasn’t surprised that when he submitted it a mere day before the emissary from their original territory arrived with the suit, that it passed and the woman was sent trudging home empty handed. Stiles had

“Thank you Alpha hale, for your kindness,” the woman said, her accent thick as she smiled at him and the baby babbled. “You and your emissary.”

Stiles shook his head, “I’m not the emissary.”

She looked confused for just a moment, “But you are wicca’milo…15”

He nodded, “Not an emissary though. He is the Alpha of the Territory though. Don’t hesitate to call if you need help. Emissary or not, it’s nice to see a familiar face every once and awhile.”

She nodded gratefully, taking his number before waving him goodbye. They would be staying at the hospital until the end of the week which was when Stiles would come pick them up and take them to the dragon’s side of town. As he headed to the jeep and drove to the museum for the noon shift of tours, he could only grin. He’d almost forgotten what it was like to weave a suit together and present it for review, he’d almost forgotten the joy of solving a problem with a few simple references and some compassion. He stepped out and told the jeep to be kind to the tourists and try not to run amuck.

He was more surprised that it worked and that Derek Hale had come to get him from the grocery store for lunch. He charmed the shop owner into allowing him to have a longer lunch and dragged Stiles in all his jeans and store t-shirt glory to a diner  for what Stiles could only call “Derek wants to know, part 2”. He had a notebook and everything.

“Is this some kind of weird way of figuring out if I’m legit… or is this an interview?”

Derek sighed somewhere in between resigned and frustrated, “Neither. You are officially on the Counsel’s “Do Not Sign” List.”

Stiles snorted, he knew that much, “Sorry, big guy. Looks like you’re stuck with Aurora.”

Derek nodded at least that didn’t turn out as badly as he imagined it to be…. And oh could it have gone so much worse. But then there was food being brought to the table and Derek had a full list of questions regarding draconian rules, laws, regulations, culture and everything that Stiles could think to tell him. The new family would need to be introduced into the population, establish contacts and he had no dragon in his pack to help ease the package.

Stiles answered all of his questions easily, writing him a script, giving him tips and letting him pick his brain for information about how to deal with the oncoming suit and the inevitable conversation he would have with the dragon population but watching Derek’s expression go from purely determined to nearly overwhelmed, he decided that it would probably be for the best of everyone involved is he did a little more than give him information.

Derek was under enough pressure trying to run the territory on his own without an emissary to try and cram his head full of draconian laws and customs in a single day, especially if it was all in Stiles’s head anyway.

“I can come with you if you’d like,” Stiles said munching on his sweet potato fries, a second best to curly fries, “The dragon community is pretty tight knit even across the seas. They’re bound to have heard of me…. also your accent is horrible.”

Derek gave him a look that Stiles interpreted as eternally grateful and he only grinned back. It wasn’t a big deal. He also missed hanging with Dragons, they were always so laid back.

It wasn’t until later that Derek realized that he hadn’t asked the question that had been burning on his tongue ever since he’d read through Stiles’ file: What the hell did he do for three years?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1 Help me. (lit. I plead to you for help.)  
> 2 Please.  
> 3 Give what? (lit. Give?)  
> 4 I came here as a friend. (lit. I ,friend, came to you.) I am Alpha Hale of Beacon Hills.   
> 5 Alpha Hale, I--  
> 6 I am Alpha Hale of Beacon hills. Who are you?  
> 7 Demon's whore.   
> * a slang term for black scaled dragons because they are the gate-keepers to the underworld  
> 8 Liar! You have treated us like animals for years!  
> 9 Quiet, Whore!  
> 10 My choice-- (lit. My life--)  
> 11 And I'll spill your blood if you keep talking. Lit. You will see your life journeyed to the Earth if you still speak!  
> 12 I am a child of Wicca, let me see your injuries.  
> 13 Worry not, she will be healed.  
> 14 Easy, they will come.  
> 15 Wiccan (lit. child of wicca)- she really means that she thought the emissary of Beacon Hills would always be a Wiccan. It's unusual for the species of the leaders of a territory change across time.


	9. The Council Descends

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Council, Derek's rage, and Stiles wants to make Derek proud (part 1)

Derek, against his wishes, is forced to deal with Aurora the entire ride to the dragon side of town. It wouldn’t have made sense to bring anyone else and if Aurora was going to be their emissary, she’d have to start pulling her own weight… even if that meant just being visible and taking notes from Stiles. Stiles promised to meet him there and help ease the tensions, while getting the new family settled in among the people. It was a lifesaver really, because he was pretty sure his insides were churning at just the thought of trying to orchestrate that transition. He stopped at the edge of the area and parked, not seeing Stiles’ jeep, but knowing that it was customary to walk into the dragon side of town. That much he remembered from tagging along with his mother and Claudia as a child… She’d had a baby on her back then, introducing them to the tiny bundle so they would know …

 _Him?_ He thought. He was sure the baby was a boy, but then why did everyone insist on this daughter of Claudia? He frowned at that thought and stowed that away for future use. There was something not quite matching up here given that his memory told him that the child was a boy.

“Why are we parking here?”

“Dragon children don’t do well around cars,” Derek supplied and got out. “Get out if you’re coming.”

She scrambled to follow as he announced himself to the watchman in the tower. The man nodded his acknowledgement and let the gate unlock, unfurl its hinges and fall open for them.

“Why do they have a gate inside the city?”

“Dragons typically live in mountains that are hard to climb, easily defended from those below. The closest mountains are outside the territory hundreds of miles from the barrier. We have no mountains, but when dragons settled here we gave them the highest parts of the territory so they would feel at home and comfortable.”

“That doesn’t explain the gate.”

“It keeps people from driving through the streets and causing accidents.”

It was a shame that he was regurgitating everything he’d learned from Stiles to the woman who was supposed to be his emissary, to tie him to the world, the human world and all other species… His head hurt with the fact that she couldn’t do her job which made his job infinitely harder.

Aurora looked around and Derek could smell the confusion and haughtiness coming off her. The dragon side of town had a very specific aesthetic that to the unlearned would look primitive. They’d fashioned their shops and homes after mountain caverns of their birthplaces. Everything was made of stone and metal to control the inevitable fires that young dragons would cause, warded against outbreaks of fights. The signs were all in draco and while he couldn’t read any of them, he knew the gist of what they all were: food, medicine, clothing, training gear, etc. From what he could tell, most shops had closed down for the night and the community bonfire was taking place if the glow from ahead was any indication. There was the sound of drums and joy, dancing in the light of the night, of community and a sense of belonging that warmed him and made his wolf preen a little bit. This is what Beacon Hills was meant to be for everyone.

He saw Stiles first, swinging a little girl around as they twirled around the bonfire. Wearing all black clothing, a utility belt made of leather and mountain climbing boots, he seemed at home among them. Moving in time with the drums, laughing and chattering in quick competent Draco, Derek offered up three prayers: one for Nikodem, one for Stiles’s mother, whomever she is, and another for whatever God sent him back to Beacon Hills when they did.

“What’s he doing here?” Aurora asked seeing him across the way.

“Serving as an in,” Derek replied and walked forward. Stiles noticed him and lifted the little girl into his arms while turning towards them and grinning.

The little girl looked at Stiles expectantly and he squeezed her against his side, “Ril Alpha Hale dan Emissary Aurora, hav-or ji in -gva. Voc oqa.0”

The little girl looked at him shyly with glowing yellow eyes then to the two. Aurora beamed at the title while Derek smiled warmly as the little girl reached out her hand in greeting.

Derek took her hand warmly.

“Tova,1” she said.

“Thank you, it’s nice to meet you,” He grinned and looked at Stiles. “How are things?”

He nodded, “They’ll settle in just fine. The meeting is about to start so come on to the bonfire.”

Derek followed the two of them as Stiles set the little girl down and said something to her. She hugged him, waved to Derek and Aurora, and then scurried off. Derek found the couple moments later, sitting by the bonfire, the baby in her father’s arms letting out a happy babble at his smiling face. His wife leaning against his shoulder speaking softly to them both.Their scales were highlighted in the bright bonfire light, enough to see the difference in their colors and the color of their daughter’s. Aurora looked between them, the difference in their scale’s coloring and paused.

“Isn’t that illegal?” She asked and Stiles looked at her incredulously.

Derek took a deep breath, “Aurora, do me a favor and don’t speak.”

Her mouth gaped and before she could retort, there was the resounding of drums and everyone settled around the bonfire. There weren’t more than a hundred people there, but all the seats were taken. Stiles kneeled at the front and motioned for the two of them to follow his example while the drums pounded and the elder, an older woman, covered in deep red scales beneath the loose and billowing dress she wore, walked forward.

Her eyes were a warm red, glowing through the night, the color of flames. She motioned for the couple to stand up and come beside her. They did, their heads bowed before her. She lifted their chins so their eyes met hers and smiled at them.

“Jil tova tak il nal jil’Kor’vt. Diþ tak yola uir to Roli iln jil. 2”

The man and woman bowed their heads respectfully even as the baby girl babbled happily up at the woman. She chuckled and kissed the baby’s head before telling them to sit near her. They sat down where they were told before she turned back to the crowd and began to speak. Derek couldn’t understand a word she said, but the feeling of authority and calm made him think of Talia’s voice. The way she soothed their fears as children and cared for them as long as she was alive.

The words of Draco always made Stiles feel like the wind was speaking to him, like his mother was speaking to him through the wind and it was heady and addicting. He’d wished he could have stayed with the dragon clan longer, but he’d had no time left if he meant to move forward with his life and being here in Beacon Hills would have to suffice.

Derek nudged him, leaning over, “What is she saying?”

Stiles looked at him almost dreamily and bit back a smile, “She’s announcing the start of the meeting and giving thanks for everyone making it given the recent poaching incidents.”

Derek frowned and looked to the group around them. They seemed to have grown closer, clinging to one another in the night for safety and assurance. He pulled his notebook for these sorts of meetings out and slide closer to hand it to Stiles.

“Please? It’d be faster wouldn’t it?”

Stiles nodded, taking it and listening so Derek could read over his shoulders as Stiles wrote the translation down. The gist of it is that several clans have reported missing members supposedly from poaching incidents. After the O’Briens were caught, the poaching incidents seemed to have increased across all Council and Hostile territories surrounding Beacon Hills, so much that people were combing territories and banding together to defend their small numbers. She told them not to panic, but the barrier seemed to be dissolving.

Derek’s heart skipped a beat as the gasp went around, frightened whispering followed and pretty soon the beginnings of panic had begun to show. The woman pressed on saying that Lenara told her that it would hold for longer than they imagined, and that Alpha Hale was working to get someone to resolve the issue as soon as possible. For now, be vigilant and keep hold of your children. Put out letters to your relatives in clan controlled territories that were against miscegenation and supported the death penalty for any reason as they were probably prime targets for poachers. Warn them, warn them of the danger before they were also lost in the night like so many others.

“Alpha Hale,” she said and Derek looked up to the woman. The congregation turned to look at him. “Emissary Aurora, do you have anything to add?”

Derek swallowed, stood and  glanced around. Taking a breath and trying to exude confidence and calm, he told them that the Beacon Hills Pack were indeed working to fix the issue. For now, there wouldn’t be a curfew established, but they’d set up more patrols to keep the residents as safe as possible from anything that may sneak in through the holes in the barrier. They weren’t terribly large, but a malicious spell, spirit, or the like could slip through. He suggested that they also stay close together, don’t let anyone wander around outside alone in any part of the territory. He of course hadn’t realized that Stiles was translating for him so that everyone could understand and watched the tension ease slightly. Their eyes looking at Stiles who spoke calm draco with a steady smile.

The woman nodded and directed her eyes to land on Stiles.

“ _Stiles, tak voc ki?_ _3_ _”_

He winced, “Ju n’nailtomjya.4”

She shook her head, “Ju in nav tak’voco ma jil vocse, Merlin milo.5”

He was never so grateful that Derek and Aurora could not understand before he stood up and took a deep breath and told them the truth. He hadn’t shared it with anyone else yet, but as they were almost like a second family across territories, it did no good to lie to them. He’d need their help tonight after all. He’d made some progress on how to fix the barrier with Lenara’s and his contacts in other territories, help, but would need their help to get a full survey to move any further in his research. There would be an influx of dragons coming from other territories in the coming days and he asked them to accept them when they arrived, and they would. As for the poaching, he was well aware of it and started his own investigation of it. By the time he was done, they seemed far calmer and smiling at him, murmuring around each other.

Derek and Aurora looked at him expecting a translation, but there was none. The woman the head of the congregation smiled across the fire at him.

“Ju nav tak’qalu il’tak, mil _._ _6_ ” She said with a smile and that made his heart clench.

Derek frowned at the shift in Stiles’ scent. it was bittersweet and oddly happy.  But then the woman was clapping and announcing that it was time to eat. Stiles cheered and went to speak with the woman, taking Derek’s notebook as Aurora pouted and glared at Stiles’s turned back.

“What were they talking about?”

“Poaching,” he said. “Apparently, it’s becoming a problem.”

“Not any more than usual… I mean poaching has always been a thing.”

Derek looked at her, “Just…. be quiet. Please.”

She looked put out, but as Stiles came back with plates for both of them and handed off the notebook she didn’t say anything but sulked as she ate. He couldn’t tell if she was being deliberately insensitive or just didn’t realize that she was being an ass. Both were disheartening.

This girl was to be his _emissary_ … Beacon Hills could only look forward to very dark days.

Derek watched Stiles flit around the group, talking to everyone, presumably answering questions and hugging children, laughing. He looked… so in place among them. He was only missing the cloak… or maybe he didn’t need it in his all black clothing and mountain climbing gear. He didn’t think he’d ever seen the boy without plaid since that first night. Derek spoke to a few other people after Stiles disappeared and it wasn’t until Aurora shot up from her sulking that he’d realized that Stiles had in fact gone missing. Now, he wore a long red cloak around his shoulders. The color of blood and billowing in the wind, he thought of Claudia Hieronim.

“What?” Aurora asked glaring at Stiles as he fiddled with the gauntlets he was sliding on. Even at a distance, Derek knew it wasn’t an emissarial cloak. The cut was wrong and the fastenings were too. Rather than the broach representing the wearer’s species, a large jewel and a collection of multicolored chains of mermaid scales held it together. There was a crest embroidered on the back that Derek couldn’t recognize, but knew it meant something dear to Stiles.

“The meeting is over, the Elders said that they’d arrange an official meeting with you sometime this week and really appreciate you coming to speak.”

How had they known he would be there? He assumed that Stiles told them, but he wasn’t sure.

“I’ve noted the highlights in your notebook, be sure to look them over and I guess you can pick my brain later.”

“Where did you get that cloak?” Aurora asked. “Did you steal it?”

He snorted, fastened his gauntlets by the shifting gold fastenings up and down each one. They were something like metal or leather, inscribed with old symbols of power from varying places. He hadn’t thought that Aurora was that much of an idiot to confuse an emissarial cloak with a battle cloak.

“Off a corpse if you want to know.”

Derek snorted at the response, but said nothing as Aurora’s jaw dropped as he fastened the last clasp at his wrist and rolled his wrists. A shiver went through him. He was wearing the gear he wore to tame wild dragons and lycans, the clothes he caught lightning and dragon fire in. He felt as he did overseas: powerful, comfortable, and ready for everything, but there was really no danger here. His body felt like it was priming, his magic priming for another mission into the hostiles that he may not come back from out of habit.

“I’d suggest you get her out of here before they start asking why she said nothing the entire meeting except for exceedingly ignorant comments.”

Aurora’s let out an appalled sound, but Derek ignored her, “Will you need a ride home?”

He shook his head, “I’ll be fine. I got here didn’t I? Go on. You’re going to have a busy day tomorrow.”

He wanted to know how Stiles could have possibly known that, but it didn’t matter because Stiles was right. Aurora, if allowed to speak her mind, would really cause more problems than he was prepared or able to deal with at the moment. He pulled Aurora along, saying his goodbye to them all before hustling her back to hear her complain and ask questions the entire ride back to the Loft. When he got her to shut up and go to bed, he headed back to the Hale House and poured himself a drink. While reviewing the notes Stiles had given him, he walked to the balcony of the master bedroom on the top floor and paused to watch a group of figures flying through the sky. The one with a crimson cloak billowing behind them directing them to split up in all different directions. A part of him knew it was Stiles, whatever part of Stiles that had come to his rescue in the forest… But how was he flying if he was just a low-level wiccan? The magic of flight wasn’t low level magic.

It seemed as though the list of questions he needed to ask Stiles had just gotten a little bit longer.

***

True to Stiles’s warning, Derek had a very busy day the next day with no help from Aurora as no one that came to meet with him wanted to speak to him with her in the room. Apparently, the word about Aurora’s ineptitude had gotten around. If it wasn’t Scott, then it was Kira or Isaac with him in the meetings depending on the person he was meeting with. When the head of the dragons came to him, he was on his own… the same for the other leaders of certain sectors of the territory that he did not have a member of the species in the pack. He was exceedingly grateful that Stiles still picked up his calls and was happy to interpret and translate so the meetings could go well.

Most spoke about the poaching concerns and other things they’ve noticed about the barrier, a few reported larger holes in the barrier in various places with creatures trying to get in by attacking the weak parts. It was a long day of making a long list to be checked out and kept an eye on, talking with Lenara about her lack of success with figuring out the barrier beyond trying to bespell the holes that were being created.

“I don’t have the power… and I don’t think there’s enough high class Wiccans to reform the barrier with simple energy, we need  schematics.”

“But…”

If Lenara couldn’t do it, who could? She was easily one of the oldest Druids in the world, if not the oldest. What brand of insanity and newness was the Beacon Hills Barrier for even Lenara’s nearly infinite knowledge of magic to be useless? And why, oh why, wasn’t there a manual, a guidebook or something regarding the barrier? It wasn’t like his mother to not think of the million ways in which any well laid plan could go wrong.

So no, it wasn’t that there wasn’t a manual or least the original designs somewhere. It was just a matter of finding them. He hadn’t gone into Talia’s study since the house was rebuilt even though it was the only reason he remembered the floor plan of the house. It had survived both fires.

“They could do it a hole at a time, but that would take _decades_ for one patch. We’re talking about trying to power a huge machine with a bunch of car batteries and we don’t even know if we have the right cables or even if the batteries are compatible.”

Derek felt his stomach turning as he asked for options, trying to find out something. they could maybe make the larger holes smaller and maybe restore some integrity to the barrier but that would only last for so long. Lenara promised to keep looking and suggested that he think about the parts of the Hale House that had survived the Fire as maybe having some answers.

The thought of entering his mother’s study after all these years made him sick and agitated, but he really didn’t have any choice. So he went to the Loft and pulled out a large pot, filled it with water, chicken, garlic and onion and waited for it to simmer before moving on to the rest of the dish. It was such an odd thing. Him, a grown man, an Alpha, wanting the simple comfort of chicken and dumplings, orange juice and a chocolate chip cookie.

He’d just poured himself a bowl when the door opened. It was Aurora.

“The Council is coming,” Aurora tells him after his meeting with Lenara. “To check in.”

Derek groaned, that’s the last thing he wanted or needed. He’d need at least three bowls and half a dozen cookies to get through this with his sanity in tact.

He doesn’t see Stiles at all for the next few days that are filled with meetings with dragons and kitsune and all other manner of creature, people from the Hostiles seeking sanctuary and the like. If he wasn’t sure that he needed a capable emissary before, he sure as hell was now. His notebooks are overflowing with information that he can’t possibly keep between his ears.He doesn’t speak most of the languages and definitely doesn’t have all the movements down. Calling Stiles every time something went wrong was more of a crutch because he couldn’t count on the man to answer the phone every time and aside from Lenara, who while experienced didn’t have it all down to an art, there was really no on else to contact.

He pleaded with Lenara and some other members of the interim packs to help educate Aurora as much as they could, but the girl was so arrogant and naive that nothing got through her thick skull. She complained about being left out of pack duties and then complained about her pack duties being more difficult than anyone else’s. She insisted that there was no way that an emissary knew that much law, or could learn that much law at one time. Lenara told her that she wasn’t trying and told her that if she wanted to learn it, truly wanted to start the road to being a real emissary, she would find herself at the library or in Lenara’s house as often as she could manage.

Aurora thought that being an emissary for a territory like Beacon Hills was just going to involve following Derek around, smiling and schmoozing not necessarily any work beyond that, but obviously she had a serious misconception about what kind of territory Beacon Hills was And if there was work for her beyond that, it would be conducted behind a desk not in actual talks.

Erica wanted to claw her face off for her stupidity.

Lenara by then had all but given up on teaching Aurora anything at all and if she didn’t adore Derek (and Derek was willing to offer anything for her assistance (he was never sure which had more of an effect)), Derek was sure that Aurora would be no closer to being of use to him as she had been the first day she arrived in Beacon Hills.

“How much could an emissary really have to worry about here? I mean we have the strongest barrier of any territory, if something happens, we’d be safe wouldn’t we?”

Erica, having already been near exploding with rage, screamed and lunged at her. Derek snatched her out of the air and carried her kicking and screaming, eyes flashing, fangs out, out of City Hall and to the nearest open square of trees. He only hoped that Scott or Kira, or _anyone_ had taken the time, and had the patience, to explain to Aurora the state of the barrier as apparently she hadn’t been fully conscious the _seventy- plus_ times they’d met to discuss the deteriorating stability of the barrier.

When he returned, Kira was tossing back shots of vodka, Scott was eating cake and ice cream, Jackson and Lydia were nowhere to be found and Allison was sharpening her arrows.

“What happened?”

“She said that we should call someone to fix it…” Allison said. “Lydia almost manifested the council of the damned.”

Derek groaned. He really should have expected as much. to make matters worse, the Council representatives of the West Coast were still due to to come in three weeks time. Between trying to get Aurora to learn _anything_ that she would need for her title, keeping the peace, and the increasing numbers of complaints related to the barrier, Derek was aggravated beyond reasonable thought most days and he tried to refrain from being near anyone who would unintentionally or intentionally push his button. His runs got longer, harder and more frequent, but did next to nothing for the roiling rage that was building.

The Council had given him an Emissary with no emissarial knowledge, the barrier was coming down, he still had no idea why or how to fix it and they had the nerve to show up in Beacon Hills looking as if they not only did not want to step foot into the territory, but as if they were walking through miles of sewage as they followed him to City Hall.

If that wasn’t enough to aggravate him, he’d already had to apologize profusely on Aurora’s behalf and pray to God that whatever Stiles told the young dragon in those soothing tones would be enough to keep Aurora alive.

He put her in the Barracks with Erica as her guard and dared her to move from the building. Erica was positively gleeful with the prospect.  

Isaac came with him to meet with the Council representatives and they had not been more than ten minutes into the meeting when the rage snapped. An older Council member representative had the nerve to vaguely insult Talia, Claudia, and the existence of beacon Hills, calling it a ragtag area dreaming of being a territory. Derek promptly went full Alpha lycan, all red eyes and sharp claws, through the man’s torso until his internal organs all slopped out onto the floor and all he could do was scream in horror. He hadn’t knicked as single thing, but seeing your insides exposed would leave and impression for the rest of the man’s life. The rest of the representatives gawked at the man’s insides on the floor, the man screaming, and their own bleak future if they dared to test Derek’s patience. As they did son, Derek calmly left the room, his claws still dripping with blood as he walked past Charlie’s desk and out into the fresh air, feeling slightly better, but not completely.

It took Isaac a full minute to follow him from pure shock. He came rushing after Derek, following the scent and trail of blood he was creating as he walked out of city hall towards his car.

“Derek?” Isaac asked catching up with him. “What--”

“Tell them if they want to try this talk again, remember that I was being kind.”

Isaac nodded, backing away to deliver the message before Derek turned left, leaving his car behind and marched after the cinnamon, hormone, horny and orange scent of Stiles to the grocery store a few blocks away. He entered and marched to the aisle Stiles stood on, humming and restocking the shelves. He knows when Stiles feels his presence as his eyes slide to the corner to glance him over like a threat before he turned fully to look at him fully. The red of his eyes, the blood on his hand, and the deep furrow of his brow: someone had pissed Derek off.

He placed the last three boxes of cereal on the shelf before telling Derek in his best customer service voice, “Kleenex is on aisle five...but wet wipes are on three.”

Derek growled and grabbed Stiles with a surprisingly human hand before dragging him outside and around the corner away from the nosy cashier and the curious people of the store. Of course, their gossip kicked up as soon as they were around the corner, whispering about the blood, about Stiles, about what kind of trouble Stiles had gotten himself into with the Alpha.

_That foolish boy..._

“What the hell did you do to get taken off the emissary potential list?” Derek asked.

“I don’t think that’s any of your business.”

“ _Stiles_ ,” he stressed through gritted teeth, the two liquid syllables catching at every break. “ _Do not test me right now._ I am barely holding on to my control as it is. Just answer me.”

Stiles watched his eyes and maybe because he was over it or because Derek looked as on edge as he was, he took a breath, crossed his arms, and told him the truth.

“I got possessed.”

Derek’s eyes narrowed, “What?”

“You heard me.”

“What does that have to do with being an emissary?”

Stiles shrugged, “The results of my psychic, spiritual, and physical post-possession examination led the Council to deem me unfit to perform the duties of an emissary for the foreseeable and unforeseeable future. As such, I am barred from emissarial school and all other such training programs until otherwise noted. Should I attempt to contest the ruling, I must undergo another set of evaluations with the Council, Emissarial Board, and the governing body of my originating territory before I can apply to be tested into an Emissarial school or any other such training programs.”

The words sound stale, rehearsed as if Stiles was reading the letter or notice he’d been sent when the career he’d been planning for was taken from him. They were bitter and biting just below the healthy layer of sarcasm that Stiles seemed to add to everything. It made Derek’s claws come out even more.

“What?”

"You heard me."

Derek shakes his head and drags his claws back, "That doesn't make any sense. You'd make a great emissary. I can't be the only one who sees that."

Stiles almost blushed at the compliment, but cleared his throat, gesturing to Derek’s bloody hand, “I uh… thanks. Erm, what exactly happened?”

“I ripped out someone’s insides.”

“Council?”He nodded and Stiles grinned, clapping his hands slowly. “I’m sure your mother is on a cloud just like this, with a shit-eating grin, saying _that’s my son_.”

Derek snorted, but mumbled a thank you anyway. His ears hot and he was sure he was blushing just a bit before running his clean hand through his hair.

He nodded, “If I ask you to be my emissarial consultant, would you?”

A moment of silence passed as Stiles made sure that his brain had processed those words properly. Emissarial Consultants were usually for just that--consultations for problems that the emissary of the territory just couldn’t handle. They were like contractors that helped manage issues that fell under emissarial duties but outside of an emissary’s abilities. it was generally harder to become a consultant than an emissary. There were no schools and no guarantees of employment, no required training, no help nor guide in becoming one. You merely showed up and took the test and it was different every time you took it, but always exceedingly hard. Becoming registered as one required testing and the support of at least one territory head, though in his case he was practically sure that he would need at least four or five...But Derek didn’t know any of that, he didn’t know what it took… He only saw a need and that Stiles would be able to fill it.

He resented his paleness because of how often he embarrassed himself, because now he was sure he was full on rosy red in the cheeks. But words were one thing, the will to back it up was another. There was no sense in getting his hopes up for something that Derek wasn’t willing to see throught. After all, if he failed, Derek’s name, his judgement, his authority as a head of a territory, would be questioned. Supporting a emissarial consultant candidate was huge for larger territories or any in the Council’s sphere.  

Other heads of territories under the Council’s eye and in the Hostiles had asked Stiles to stay and he’d turned them down saying that Beacon Hills was his home, for better or for worse, he couldn’t just run off to a new territory permanently without settling his business here. Not to mention, none of them had been willing to support his application to be a consultant. They couldn’t risk what would happen if he failed the exam after all. But Derek… it seemed as though Derek was willing.

It was beginning to look like he would never settle his business here if Derek was willing to put in a good word for him to be allowed to take the Consultant’s exam and be certified. Lenara said he would never settle his affairs here and end up with a “very annoying pack” but a very “doting, loving, domineering, satiating and delicious husband”. Who that was he didn’t know but she was sure that he would “never” be free of Beacon Hills.

 _You’re going to be trapped here… in between extremely sexy thighs._ He’d thought in the moment that she was referring to herself until she said “blow jobs”. _Damn._

“You sure about that? Maybe I like stocking shelves.” Stiles said with a shrug.

“Curly Fries,” Derek said. “And whatever else you need, name your price.”

Stiles shrugged again making himself remain calm. Nothing was certain until there was signed documentation, nothing was certain until he was registered.

“Sure, since according to my psychic consultation with Lenara the Great I will be settling here. Scotty’s my bro, Dad’s my Dad and Kira’s like a sister, I have a personal investment in keeping them alive… besides… I sort of love Beacon Hills. So yeah… I’ll apply.”

Derek takes some solace in the fact that Stiles isn’t lying and asks him to direct him towards the wet wipes. Stiles takes him to aisle three and suggests the brand in a box with a baby on the package saying that it would probably be best to have some around for future incidents that were sure to happen. Stiles rings him up with all the flair of a cashier attendant until Derek demands his presence at the Hale house at eight o’clock to discuss their arrangement going forward and figure out what Stiles would need from him to get registered. Stiles had the updated information for applications already prepared, he’d kept it up to date since he’d gotten that notice, hoping that someone would have faith enough in him to support him.

His babcia’s Clan leader would have been the obvious choice, but nepotism was against the rules and he didn’t dare ask her to talk to anyone. It would do him no good if they had faith in her but not in him. Damn his fucking principles.

“I’ll be on time,” Stiles said with a grin. “Promise.”  

Derek snorts and opens the wet wipes with his clean hand as he walks out and begins to clean his hands. Stiles yells after him that he should get his nails too and he can’t help but scoff. For some reason, he’s feeling a little better about it all now that he’s gotten that answer from Stiles. The world didn’t seem to be rubbing all of his senses the wrong way anymore, no matter how much it really should.

***

 After hearing the outburst in the council meeting, Erica called the meeting. They didn’t include Aurora in it as it was just easier not to and there was no need for them to be agitated on top of the residual agitation their alpha was dishing out.

“Erica,” Scott started warily, biting into a slice of cheesecake. “Erica called the meeting?”

Isaac nodded as she stood up and announced the purpose of the meeting was to get Derek laid. He should have seen this coming really. They all should have. Erica, being the resident vampyr, had an odd sense about what was going on inside their alphas head… of course she suggested that everything could be fixed with enough sex. Isaac hadn’t decided if that was a strictly Erica thing or just a vampyr thing.

“Really? We’re holding a meeting about this?”

Erica nodded and pulled up a whiteboard and everyone gasped. If Erica had a white board things were getting serious.  There was an oddly well done illustration of Derek in mortal and wolf form and as she walked through her surprisingly well done presentation, they understood the cloud that had been hanging over Derek’s head for years. Between the Hale Fire, that crazy bitch that burned his house down the second time, losing his family and his ability to trust anyone really, the stress of being an alpha when he was never trained for it and having no real way to cool off… They were surprised that he stopped at simply slicing the guy open and not a full on mauling.

“I have a newfound respect for Derek’s self-control…” Scott said in awe. “I wish I had some.”

“So what do you suggest?” Lydia asked, lounging far more gracefully than she had the right to on an ottoman chair. “Derek isn’t a one-night stand for any reason kind of guy.”

“I’ve thought of that Madame Banshee,” Erica said. “And under the guise of getting him laid, this will be more about Derek going out, meeting people, and acting his damn age for once. You now that mythical thing called _socializing_.”

Lydia tilted her head, fake him out with the idea that it was about sex and get him to at least have a social night… It was practically tactical genius.

“Alright… how?”

Erica pulled out a flyer and they all groaned: Lenara’s Love Circle was apparently having an event in two days time.

“You can’t think he’ll do that…”Scott said around a cupcake. “It’s Derek.”

Erica pointed to the flyer, “It’s his age group, all established professionals, looking for a social night out with commitment or expectations, per Lenara, but he doesn’t have to know that. It’ll work.”

They’re skeptical, but  Erica is nothing if not a genius at getting Derek to do things for his own good (within reason). After a good ten minute manifesto on exactly why it would do him more good to put on some nice clothes and be flirted with for a few hours by women with sense rather than running all the time, Derek agreed if only because Erica used the pouty vampyr face on him, which she knows is a quick way to get Derek to agree to just about anything. He agrees to go that Friday barring any major catastrophe and tells them he’ll be at the Hale House in a meeting to get them some reliable help.

Erica beamed at him, kissed his cheek and told him to wear that deep green henley that he likes to pretend he doesn’t own.

“And the good jeans, the ones that Lenara bought you.”

He groaned at that but agreed just to avoid another pout. Lenara bought him jeans that accentuated his best “assets” according to her. Which, in Derek-speak, meant that they hugged everything just tight enough to hint, but not tight enough to be uncomfortable or scandalous even… and while he hated the idea of essentially putting himself in a Derek-tailored display case, the jeans were exceedingly comfortable.

When he arrived at home, Stiles was sitting on his porch swinging lightly. Lounging with the phone pressed to his ear speaking quick words that felt like flower petals on his skin and a world moving too fast. He hadn’t realized that Derek had arrived there. Speaking calmly, easy, even as he seemed agitated, kicking the porch to keep the swing in motion. The words got smoother, softer, charmingly soft until Stiles smiled and said a few more words before hanging up.

“Am I interrupting?” Derek asked.

Stiles shook his head, “Just calling in a few favors is all.”

Derek nodded, but didn’t ask. He was already asking so much it seemed of Stiles, there was no need to be nosy, no matter how much he wanted to really, really know what kind of favors Stiles was calling in and why he had those favors in the first place. He bet it had something to do with Stiles’s ability to fly.

When they get settled in Derek’s office, the alpha slides his laptop across the table towards Stiles with the explanation that he found an Emissarial Consultant contract on the Council’s website and modified it. He’d left all information regarding payment general as “commensurate to your skill set” which would be defined by the Counsel’s test. The test historically been three hours long, divided into seven parts. The most recent version of the test and the hardest, according to the forums, was four and a half hours long, divided into seven sections and had a portfolio component to it. It seemed that the Council was really trying to discourage people from going the emissarial consultant route unless there was no other choice, or they could really cut it. In short, truly failed emissaries need not apply. The Emissarial Board, which regulated the assignment, licensing, and training of official emissaries created an adjacent, and sub division, for Consultants called the Marshal Advisory Board shortly after the creation of the Emissarial Board. It begun as a secret task force of Emissaries who’s knowledge was far too vast to be contained to one territory in the days where territories were just then being established. They were the unofficial back-up of the Emissaries and practical task force of the Council for when disputes between territories, or issues in the Hostiles, needed resolutions that Emissaries either couldn’t or wouldn’t enact. They had once been called Marshals.

Now, they were much of the same, but the requirements for becoming a current day Consultant, as Marshall sounded too war-like for the new generations, was not just combat skill, but true emissarial knowledge and the ability to network, the fortitude to survive with little to no help. It was rough.

Most people didn’t know that and thought of it more of a place for failed emissaries. Anyone who knew what the M.A.B. was about knew that anyone with enough training could become an Emissary, not every emissary and not every person was meant to be a Consultant, or Marshall depending on how old the person was.

If Stiles had to guess, Derek thought of Consultants as back-up Emissaries, people who probably passed the emissarial test, or at least could, but had no desire to be attached to one territory, essentially free-spirited Emissaries. The Consultant ranks carried over from the time of them being called Marshals. Admirals were the highest class. Below them were Generals, then Colonels, Majors, Lieutenants, Officer, and Sergeants. He’d be ranked based on his knowledge and abilities which would mean he’d have to come back and negotiate payment, and hours… and invoices. Stiles shuddered, it sounded like a nightmare of paperwork and red tape.

“Anyway we can not have that much paperwork?”

Derek snorted, “I’m sure if you fill out the payroll forms at the office, Charlie can get you set up for automatic deposit.”

Stiles nodded, “Sounds like timecards which are a lot better than invoices.”

Derek snorted and sent the document to the printer. They signed two copies. Stiles gets him to sign the documents he needed to take the test and slowly, the gravity of the situation begins to dawn on him: he was going to be an emissarial consultant. There was no question in his mind if he would pass the test--no. Just the thought of someone believing in him enough was enough to make him want to study and practice for things he already knew.

“I’m going to fucking destroy that test,” he said, flushed red, eyes bright and happy staring at the pages in absolute wonder.

Derek had no doubt that he would and doesn’t ask why there was that overjoyed and bittersweet note to his scent. He offers to cook dinner for Stiles that night and talk about what Derek really needs helps with when it comes to managing the territories. It’s chicken parmesan so good Stiles could cry.

“I saw you,” he said and Stiles tilted his head as he slid a spoon full of chocolate and brownie in his mouth. “That night, flying with the dragons.”

Stiles blinked, placed the stupidly chocolatey spoonful of brownie down and let out a slow smile, “So this is the interrogation.”

“No,” Derek assured. “Not an interrogation… I just… wanted to know… how?”

He smiled, “I learned a lot while overseas.”

Derek let out a huff, knowing that was probably the best answer he was going to get from the other. Stiles’s phone chimed letting him know that he had a confirmation for his registration and the list and format of documentation he would need to bring with him in three days’ time to the testing center in Los Angeles.

Stiles takes his leave then, saying that he had a portfolio to put together and things to study for.

“Thank you,” he said before he left with a smile that made Derek’s stomach flip. “I won’t let you down. I promise.”

Derek nodded, “I have no fear that you could.”

He watches the flush on his cheeks grow and him to go bounding down the steps towards the Jeep that sits revved in the driveway. With that solved, all he had to do now was survive Lenara’s “Love Circle.”

God, the things he did for his Pack.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 0\. This is Alpha Hale and Emissary Aurora, they’ve come here as a help. Say greetings/hello.  
> 1\. Greetings/Hello.  
> 2\. We welcome you to our clan, may you find peace and acceptance here with us.  
> 3\. Stiles, do you have something to say?  
> 4\. I am not an emissary. lit. I am no star-tamer.  
> * The term for emissaries in draco comes from the legend of the first emissary of a Clan. The legend says that she controlled the stars so that they rained down on an enemy territory.  
> 5\. As I see you are the one we should hear, son of Merlin. (lit. I see your speech as what we should hear, child of Merlin.)  
> 6\. I see your mother in you, child  
> 


	10. Believe In Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles wants to make Derek proud (part 2), Stiles is a busy boy, "On Poaching", barrier talks, and Jackson meets his family (what a stroke to the ego).
> 
> P.S. Lenara and Dasha... Yeah

“So, how was it?” Erica asks him two days later. He’s returned on a brighter mood from the “Love Circle” with numbers of everyone who was there and a promise to catch up later to talk about their meeting with the Alpha of Beacon Hills. Maybe it was a little mean to keep that bit of information from them, but he was there as Derek not Alpha Hale so hopefully they would understand… or they already knew who he was and didn’t bother to point it out. Either way, that was a battle for tomorrow while Stiles was gone to L.A. for testing. Everyone, even Aurora is there to his surprise and it didn’t seem as though there had been any fighting about to transpire. They all seemed interested in his response though.

Derek rolled his eyes, “It was fine.”

Erica groaned and leapt at him, attaching herself to his back like a monkey, “Give us more than that Alpha-kins!”

“Alphakins?”

“Papa Wolf?”

“I’m not that much older than you.”

“Derek…” she whined. “Please?”

He sighed and caved taking a seat on the couch. He met Lenara’s niece from New York and spent the majority of the night talking with her and a few other women from out of territory. They were all from various programs here to study the barrier, he guessed favors called in by Lenara, but they only glanced over that. All in all it was an enjoyable night, fun even and Erica only beamed at him and kissed his cheek,

“You look better,” she said. “I’m glad you had fun… I’m also glad you met everyone that’s supposed to be helping us fix the barrier.”

He nodded, “Yes, it did work out rather well…”

She grinned and Derek asked Scott on the whereabouts of Stiles.

“The Sheriff says he’s taken over their basement for studying. He still isn’t sure how he got all of those books there or why there is so much mail arriving in the last few days. He’s left multiple notes and days of food prepared so Nikodem isn’t worried.”

Derek nodded, sounded like Stiles was preparing for something major. How serious could this test be? It couldn’t be as serious as the emissary test...could it?

“Books?” Aurora asked. “Books on what?”

Scott shrugged, “Don’t know, but it’s probably something to do with the test he’s taking tomorrow.”

“Test?” Erica asked. “Test for what?”

“To become an Emissarial Consultant,” Scott said.

Aurora seemed to blanch as Erica tilted her head, “The Council has those? Why haven’t we gotten one?”

Aurora’s eyes narrowed at the barely veiled insult.

Derek nodded, “According to the Council, only certain ranks of Consultants are allowed to work with certain kinds of territories. We’re a third-class territory and only extremely high ranking Consultants are allowed to work with those.”

Given that there was such a shortage of high class consultant, Derek hadn’t gotten a chance to even screen the few that were there and always seemed to be busy. Charlie called all thirty-one of them for at least three weeks straight before Derek just told her to give up as it was obvious that no one had the time or the will to help them. That had been a week before Aurora was set to arrive and after a myriad of insane incidents had plagued the territory:police station bombings, strange weather, etc.

Erica snorted, “Does that put us right above the Hostiles then?”

Derek nodded. The road to becoming a first-class territory began with getting an emissary assigned by the Council and the Council’s approval of the head of the territory. Derek had flatly refused to pay dues to the Council for their protection, but had accepted their emissary. They’d only just received the third-class status when Aurora arrived.

“How high class?” Aurora asked.

“Shouldn’t you know this?” Jackson muttered, but Derek answered her.

“A Major or higher.”

Scott scrolled through his phone, “Marshal Advisory Board… my Mom used to talk about them. Apparently, there are mixed thoughts about them.”

Derek didn’t care. If Stiles was at least a Major Consultant or higher, he’d have someone at least functional and that was all that mattered.Aurora continued to look displeased before leaving for bed and Derek bid them goodnight after announcing the schedule for tomorrow. He really hoped that the test wouldn’t take long.

*

Stiles woke up early, not that he didn’t always, but this was different. He’d made sure to make himself go to sleep early the night before after prepping his clothes, his full portfolio and everything else he would need in the messenger bag he’d been given by a dragon clan in Australia. After checking and double, triple, quadruple checking the layout of his portfolio against the requirements set forth by the council, he’d closed the thick binder, sealed it with a tie, placed it in the given envelope and slid it into the bag before bed. All of his test registration papers were there as well.

It was morning now, before dawn. The mysticism of the night and encroaching dawn was humming in his blood. He takes a few minutes to center himself, to calm his magic, and meditate. To focus on the task at hand before dressing. He slides into the jeans that Dasha bought him, a hooded blood red button up shirt, a sleek looking black vest,  before actually styling his hair. When he’s done, he slides on his battle gauntlets and grabs everything. Phone, messenger bag, registration papers, portfolio and his wallet all accounted for, he heads down the stairs to make breakfast.

Nikodem comes downstairs to see his son moving around in the kitchen. Black mountain climbing boots on his feet, wiccan blood red red and styled hair: he looks nothing like the kid who’d left, and every bit a young emissary. Unfortunately, he still gets fussed at for wanting more bacon. After promising to eat a full cup of greek yogurt with only the correct amount of honey, Stiles gets ready to go.

“Give ‘em hell,” Nikodem tells him as Stiles leaves the kitchen.

Stiles only nods and walks out the front door.The jeep is waiting at the end of the driveway for him, revved, warmed up in the early morning coolness and playing “You’re the Best” by Joe Esposito as he climbs in behind the driver’s wheel.

He laughed and settled himself behind the wheel before beginning the drive to Los Angeles’s Official Council Testing Center. When he arrives, he parks in the adjoining parking garage. The attendant directs him to the double doors and to the front desk. The security officer directs him up the stairs to the testing center on the second floor. The woman who greets him at the front desk looks at him as if he’s impossible as he turns over his registration information and all the supplemental information. He guesses that it’s the weight of the portfolio package that surprises her. She gives him the testing badge and directs him towards the second part of the process: pictures and profile set-up. After the technician, takes his picture, he sets up Stiles’s profile under “Stiles” as he requested and directs him into the testing room.

At a glance, he can tell that only a few of them are trained in emissarial work or have any experience. They have their eyes closed, they’re observing everyone around them, they acknowledge him when he comes in. That’s all of two people in the room. The other four are of a a very different background.

“I hear becoming a consultant is easier than being an emissary, but with more perks,” he hears one of the small group sitting near the front say as he takes an open seat a few rows behind.

“It doesn’t keep you from helping who you can.”

He nodded, that was about what he expected. What they didn’t know was that consultant work was harder, specifically because there was never anyone to back you and help you earn a territory’s trust. Will a free agent, you were also constantly having to prove yourself. It wasn’t for someone who just wanted the “perks”.

Derek trusted him. He trusted him enough to be his main endorsement and he’d promised him that he was going to destroy this test.

“And getting paid better for it,” the small group laughed at that. “I think I’ll be just fine as a Sergeant or something. Take it nice and easy.”

Of the 100 currently active and registered consultants, 36 of them were Sergeants, 19 were Officers, 14 of them were Lieutenants, 12 were Majors, 9 were Colonels, and 6 were Generals. According to the latest release by the M.A.B., one of the four Admirals was retiring at the end of the year and another had been M.I.A. on an assignment in Lithuania. There were plenty of people (69 people in the world exactly) that were willing, and able, to handle. If you weren’t at least a Major level consultant, there was a good chance that you would never get a job that you were eligible and able to do.

The reason this year’s round of testing was so important was because so many seasoned Consultants had officially retired and deactivated their profiles. There had been an en masse call for anyone who’d been on track to become an emissary but had been thrown off for one reason or another. Without Consultants, were there many territories that didn’t have mediators for land disputes and other issues, no extra research force in the case of the Council and a myriad of other issues that couldn’t, or wouldn’t, be solved by an emissary alone.

He shook his head, none of that was important now as the proctor came into the room and began to explain. The pages, unmoveable pieces of parchment, coded in a myriad of spells and enchantments appeared as she said they would. They were under a masking spell and would be the only sheets that they would need. The pen to write would appear when the test began. Use of any other pages or writing utensils would not be allowed. There were only two sheets: one for the questions which would appear as he moved through the test, and one for his answers.

“You have four and a half hours to complete six of the seven sections. The last section will be held elsewhere and your paperwork will alert you to when you are meant to step outside to complete the practical section.”

The six were to test the knowledge of species and cultures, the last would be to see if they could apply their knowledge in any meaningful way.Stiles knew that and had been preparing for it all. He took a deep breath, and prayed for strength to the Goddess.

Please let me do this one thing right, if not for me… then for Derek.

“You may begin.”

Writing appeared on the page before him, he picked up the pen that appeared and began to write. His hand written answers became legible Courier New font on the page as he wrote and the questions became increasingly difficult. People got up at random intervals, not returning for forty or so minutes because of the five minute break before and after the practical section. When it was Stiles’s turn, he stood and left the room. Breathing deeply and passed one of the members of the small group leaning against the wall in tears.

“They’re harsh…” she said.

Stiles smiled and offered her a kleenex before he was called in. The woman sitting across from him was obviously a were-dragon. He smiled at her kindly and began the exchange. A few moments into the conversation in Draco, six others came in and Stiles understood immediately what was going on: they were members of every species except for his own and all had a distinct distaste for him as a Wiccan. He kept his heart rate steady and met their eyes, greeting them all properly and offering them to sit at the roundtable to discuss the issue at hand. They only spoke their own languages, voicing their concern and he nodded, taking notes, looking over the documents they brought with them and being sure to be the calming factor in the obviously heated argument regarding the land dispute.  When they’d all voiced their concerns, demands, and other threats, he began the explanation of a viable solution which everyone could be happy with: join forces.

At the end of the thirty minutes, he had a signed agreement and everyone even shook hands with one another. He sent them off as was proper through the door they entered and the final farewell to the were-dragon woman who smiled.

“Ju’mjya nailqov,7” she said with a nod.

“il'Nova gi dan n'hal 8,” he replied and sent her on her way. The timer went off a few minutes after they’d left and he stepped into the hallway.

He had no doubt that scenario was based on a hostiles situation. Ironically, he’d faced a situation similar to that already.

The rest of the test was easy, he felt as though he’d sailed through far more questions than was supposed to be on a four and a half hour test by the end of it.

“The test is now over. Please sign your tests. After that, I will explain a little more and you all can be on your way.”

He took a breath and signed the last lines of the oath of the emissary in old Wiccan script:

Ic se swiðran onf wystran munde cyninga, se staðol ond ancor æhtelandes æðe on minre sāwuldrīore weorþian þa halig folgað hwelċum ic onfengon. 9

When the pages disappear, everyone looked at the proctor who looked positively sunny.

“Congratulations on finishing the test! You may have been wondering about the format of the exam and why only the practical portion was marked. In truth, the questions you answered were a part of a mixed bag of questions, equally divided into six categories: Intra-species law, Inter-species Law, History, Culture, Magic, and Council Law. The developers for the question add to a very long list of questions and the questions you receive are based on your performance throughout the test. for example, if your first quest was an A level question and got it right, you could expect that the next question would be A or higher, while if you got it wrong, it would workdown. Your scores will be calculated within a few hours, your portfolios are already under review and check. Your results and the rank you’ve earned will be posted to your account and that account will be released on the international database by five o’clock today. Due note, that all of your application materials are blind graded, if you were hoping for nepotism, you’ve come to the wrong place. Any questions?”

“What else goes on our profile and can we edit it?”

The portfolio materials that were submitted and verified, reviews from anyone you’ve done work for, and of course your given contact information would be posted on the site as well as any other information the Council saw fit to add. In addition, people were allowed to post to your profile if they were not mentioned in the submitted portfolio. It was basically your business page with the Board. You could use to track payments and manage your assignments as well, display your availability via the hosted calendar. All of the nitty gritty details would be given with the email and package sent when the profile was available.

Stiles stood from his seat and shuffled out behind the rest of the crowd with a deep breath. Some people cried, some complained that it was obviously a trick and false advertisement, and other, like himself, just walked to their cars and left.

The drive back to Beacon Hills is almost solemn. Nikodem is gone when he pulls up, the jeep didn’t play anything the whole way and when he steps inside the house and takes a deep breath, his legs give out from beneath him. Tears stream over his cheeks and he feels as though he’s checked out of his body for a little while. Magic sizzles and leaps out of his fingertips, thick drop of pure potential into the floorboards, rushing out of him as his body cries and he can’t think of why he was crying. Why he was hurting, why the maelstrom in his chest was there at all. It’s in the middle of the magical meltdown that his phone rings with a ringtone called “Cheer” and Stiles answers.

“Where are you man?” Scott asked, “You better not be alone.”

“I just got back.”

“I’m coming to get you! We’re going to the police department for your score posting.”

“Trying to publically humiliate me?” he asks, wondering how he still manages wry when he’s crying like this.

No doubt that his face was that ugly red and blotchy.

Scott snorted, “Whatever. Don’t go anywhere.”

Scott arrives and and drags a barely composed Stiles out to his car for the drive to the police station. It’s a small gathering--just him, Scott, Kira, and Nikodem in Nikodem’s office waiting for the results to post. Kira and Scott have brought Pack business to work on while they wait. Nikodem’s still working and Stiles is pleading to the universe for something to do, but has nothing.

“You nervous?” Kira asked around three o’clock. Nikodem has begun to search for the Marshall Board Directory Site to keep open behind all of his work.

“A little,” he said.

“Derek’s not,” Kira said and Stiles is stuck by how calm he feels hearing that. “He’ll be here soon.”

Stiles shook his head, “There’s no reason for that--”

“Besides the fact that he wants to. I’m pretty sure Lenara is coming too, with cake… it might be inappropriate so be careful.”

He snorted and nodded. A deputy came to ask for his opinion on a case and Stiles jumped at the chance to think about anything other than his results. Around five o’clock Derek arrives and the deputies are pulling people into the main debriefing room, setting up the projector and it’s all Stiles can do not to freak out because… why were they doing this?

Some of the deputies, newer, were skeptical, others who knew him well were taking bets on his rank with that knowing grin. Derek greeted him with all the warmness and composure that Stiles didn’t have and calmly pushed Stiles to the front of the room. He forces Stiles into a chair beside the projector as more and more people file in. Someone hooks up a laptop as the rest of the Pack arrives including Aurora who takes a seat with a skeptical and dismissive look.

She makes him think of that notice he received and his hands shake. He isn’t sure if it’s rage or panic, but he can feel the beginning of a panic attack. When his phone chimes with the announcement that his profile is active and his scores are posted, someone forces the laptop in his lap and Derek’s hand squeezes his shoulder.

“Deep breath,” he said. “No matter what, you make a great emissary.”

Stiles swallows and unlocks his phone to read his login information and he logs in to the site, officially confirming his profile as active.

“It’s about damn time,” Nikodem complains walking in. “I’ve been watching it for hours and there were a bunch of new additions that weren’t you...and they weren’t higher than an Officer. There were a couple of fails too.”

With everyone in attendance, there’s no chance to stall so Stiles clicks the link to his profile that he’s been sent via email and waits for it to load on the laptop’s screen.The moment feels more tense than it should, yet Derek’s hand on his shoulder feels more relaxed than ever. Perhaps he knows something everyone else doesn’t. When it opens, the first thing to catch anyone’s eye (Erica’s) is the picture.

“Whoo hot stuff!”

Kira gives out a wolf whistle that makes him glower in their general direction. Beneath the photo, there his basic info: age, region, birth territory, species, etc and the score bars. There are seven, all full and six out of six stars beneath that, highlighted. The word beside “Marshall Classification” makes his heart stutter: Admiral.

“Holy shit,” Nikodem said.

“Holy shit,” Derek said.

“Fuck yeah!” Scott said cheering.

The room goes up in cheers and confetti, except for Aurora who is somewhere between shocked and enraged. Stiles is staring at that word, his eyes burning and he hears himself laughing and crying. Cause, yeah… he knew he was awesome, but to have it verified in such a public way made his insides quake.

He grinned paging through his references, the ones he’d submitted through his portfolio is there, his experience. It must have been up earlier for territory heads because heads of territories, Hostiles and Council, have posted reviews to his profile. People he knew and wouldn’t back him before are now posting the things he’s done for them. More and more, Warsaw, Delhi, Delphi, London, Romania even. His whole life overseas was being posted there with the exception of the magic of course. He grinned at the pictures that were posted of him with families and heads of territories. Blood smeared, covered in God knew what, mud and grinning at the camera. Candid photos of the work he’d done rebuilding communities.

“Wow,” Scott pipped up and it was then that he realized that he wasn’t  looking over it on his own. It was being broadcasted on the projection screen too… and Derek was looking over his shoulder.

“Derek’s going to be hard pressed to keep you here, isn’t he?’

Stiles laughed, “He’s already got me under contract.”

“Smart Alpha…”

When he goes to see Derek in his office the next day, Stiles isn’t sure what t to say. He’s already gotten a hundred requests through the portal to consider.  Derek doesn’t need him to guarantee exclusivity, he needs access to an emissarial presence. The fact that Aurora would be away for some undetermined amount of time for emissary training was helping his nerves tremendously.

“Council finally rethought that did they?’

“I understand that you’re ranked very high.”

He grinned, “As I told you I would.”

It doesn’t take long for Stiles to realize that his ranking makes a larger difference in pay than he thought. He thought it would be more like fifty dollars more… In reality, it was more than 200 dollars an hour of a difference depending on the task. Derek, wanting to put him on retainer, added an extra 200 to the already steep price.

“What the hell am I going to do with all of that?”

Derek shrugged,”Don’t know.”

“Can Beacon Hills--never mind. Of course we can.”

From the amount of research done in beacon hills and the need for that research…. Beacon Hills was one of the wealthiest territories in the world, second only to Greece or England...but not everyone had a gate to hell in their territory to be studied.

Derek sent him off with baked goods, a grin, and a congratulations. he would probably have to quit working at the the grocery store and the library as it seemed he was more than just popular… but the shortage of high class consultants had left plenty of territories in the lurch. His council account was full of requests and his personal email was as well, all insanely difficult or extreme cases…. Yep. he’d definitely have to quit his jobs.

His consultant passes and things showed up the next day and he wondered how much it would burn the Council to know that he could have been a fantastic emissary if they hadn’t fucked it all up. Now, he has to, on principle, show up emissaries around the world.

So he takes himself to the nearest Best Buy to look for a laptop and ends up with some high end PC laptop (because Apple pissed him off on principle) and went to the library. He set up the laptop, logged on to his profile and began the exceedingly long screening process.

***

A few weeks pass in a flurry. Stiles is on the phone more often than not if he’s in Beacon Hills. He has almost exclusive rights to an office in City Hall per Derek’s want to have him close if he’s in territory and the librarians love him so much that they have a study room in his favorite section always open for him. If he’s not on the phone then he’s with Derek...It’s far more likely that he isn’t in the territory at all.

Today is a rare day when Stiles is in territory. Lydia and Jackson knock on the door of the study room he’s occupying, glance around at the books stacked around him and the mess of papers before him before telling him that he had to come with them. The patrons walking by who knew him as a troublemaker shook their heads and Stiles told the librarians at the front desk that he was being kidnapped by two members of the Beacon Hills Pack.

“If I’m not back tonight, call my Dad.Look in the ditches, that’s probably where I”ll be.”

The older woman only laughed and shooed him away. Stiles climbed into Jackson’s car with a smile. Leather seats, of course he had leather seats. They arrived at the Loft and guided him into the elevator and up the stairs. He sits in the living room with the two of them watching him. Realizing that nothing was happening quite yet, he leaned back, unlocked his phone, and continued the book in ancient draco that he’s borrowing from the library.

It’s later, maybe thirty minutes before Derek shows up looking between the three and sighs.

“When I said pick him up, I didn’t mean hold him hostage.”

Lydia had the nerve to inspect her nails and ignore the disapproval in his voice as Derek came towards them.

“Come on, Stiles,” he said. “To the office.”

Stiles rolls off the couch to follow him down the hall. The office is nicely decorated and gives the sense of authority and calm. Derek takes a seat and Stiles slumps into a chair, still scrolling through the book, absorbing the information faster than he can stand it. It’s such an awesome story and may even hold some answers for the epidemic ripping through the leviathan clan just north of D.C.

“So, why’d you have me kidnapped?”

Derek snorted, “I have some questions about poaching.”

Stiles’ entire body freezes. His scent shifts into disgust and alertness. He swallows and then sits up, bookmarking his page and setting his phone down. He’s never seen anyone react to the mention of poaching that way before. Derek didn’t know much about it but peripheral information, but with the sudden lull in the always insane pace of Beacon Hills, it was time to knowledge up.

“I’m listening.”

“After Scott made that arrest in Texas and freed all those people the poaching rate has gone up for some reason.”

Stiles nodded. That was because the O’Briens were one of the largest black market dealers for magical items and weapons in the United States. While they were in charge, and employing the techniques for keeping their prey alive to keep producing, there was no way any rookies had a chance of taking a slice of the market.

Now, there were a lot of rookie poachers that were scrambling to be the next head honcho of poaching while failing to fill the void left. They didn’t have the technique, smarts, or the connections that the O’Brien Pack had. The O’Brien Pack had supplied a lot of shady Wiccan, Druid, and other guilds with supplies in return for enchantments to avoid detection and free passage into and out of territories. The hatred between the races inter- and intra-racially definitely fueled it as well. Family members used it as a threat and a punishment, selling members for parts, selling pack members for parts… The whole system , which was willfully unacknowledged by the Council, was sickening. Yes, there were laws against poaching, but there weren’t very strong or adhered to when the Council got cuts under the table. Poaching was supposed to be a punishment or very much a part of the Hostiles thing even though the majority of poaching cases happened in a Council recognized territories. With the threat of being torn apart to be mixed in with any number of potions for any number of things hanging over their heads, it kept Territories in line, it kept leaders of those territories under the thumb of the ignorant  and brainwashed masses… It kept the masses ignorant.

You could even say that poachers were in the employ of the Council’s push for more power.

“It’s a sick cycle,” Stiles said. “I’m not sure what else you’d like me to say about it.”

“I want to know everything I can.”

Stiles smiled, “This is going to take a while…”

Derek hadn’t realized how long it would take and the chilling realization of what exactly “poaching” meant to people who had no protection like the Beacon Hills Barrier. It meant the rest of your life being kept alive in a slow torture as parts of you were sold or taken when the O’Brien Pack was still active. It meant helplessness and cruelty. Now, it just meant meaningless, unhonored death. He shuddered, tightening his fist.

“You’d fetch a hefty price,” Stiles said. “Alpha Hale.”

His eyes narrowed, “What?”

“Pureblood lycan, very long lineage, Hale especially, and an alpha…lots of potions would be boosted just with a few drops of blood… let alone an organ or two.”

“What about Wiccans?”

“The heart and the brain,” Stiles said with a wry smile. “For most. If you’ve got lineage, then blood is good too.”

Derek swallowed, he’d somehow amassed a Pack of extremely rare items, perfect for poaching… not to mention Beacon Hills—

“Yes, Beacon Hills has the largest target drawn over it: no Council really to protect it, a failing barrier… the poaching issue had practically stopped existing for a while when Emissary Hieronim and Talia got  Beacon Hills established as a territory… at least in Beacon Hills.”

“And now… the barrier...”

Stiles swallowed and Derek breathed deeply, “What do you know about the barrier?”

Stiles smiled, “A lot of things, but not enough to answer the questions you want to ask.”

“Can it be fixed?”

Stiles nodded, “In theory, it can be reforged, yes.”

Derek frowned and Stiles breathed out, “The barrier was created by Emissary Hieronim between a dead Alpha and a not quite settled Alpha. In theory, it could be reforged with enough magic and a strong enough alpha presence.”

Derek swallowed, “Laura… wasn’t strong enough?”

Stiles smiled, “It’s not about strength of an alpha, it’s about their connection to the land and to the people.”

“Laura wasn’t here long enough?”

“And Beacon Hills was kind of still smarting from Emissary Hieronim’s death, yes.”

Derek nodded slowly and then looked at Stiles, “Well how do I reassure the people of Beacon Hills that we’ve got everything under control?”

“Maybe… by actually having things under control?”

He growled, “Stiles.”

He shrugged, “May help you to have a formal State of the Territory Address.”

Derek’s eyebrows shot up, “People freak out when they don’t know things more than when you’re honest with them.”

Derek nodded, “I don’t know anything right now.”

“Sure you do,” Stiles grinned. “You know plenty.”

Derek frowned as Stiles fished out a few pages from his pocket, “These are for you.”

Derek swallowed, taking the pages and amazed at the oddly neat handwriting, notes on the barrier, impossibly detailed and diagrams.

“How… did you get this?”

“Flying with the dragons,” he grinned. “Had a bit of help getting a full survey of the territory…”

Derek looked at him, “Surprisingly, people like you, Derek, and they want to help. But they can’t help defend and protect when they know nothing.”

Derek nodded, he hadn’t even known anything about the barrier beyond the fact that it was decaying for a myriad of reasons. This… was why Heads of Territories needed Emissaries. He almost groaned, his tongue itching to take Stiles on as the emissary and tell the Council to go fuck themselves…But that wasn’t in line with what needed to happen he was sure. The Council, for all their bumbling, came with connections across the world that Derek would need to protect Beacon Hills should the barrier fail completely. It was an old territory, one of the oldest, with the richest history and some of the most magical lands. Great and terrible things had happened in Beacon Hills making it a nexus for great terror or great good.

The barrier was a double-edged sword in some way because it was plugged into the very foundations of Beacon Hills. It was terrifying sometimes to think that in the wrong hands, it could turn inward and destroy them all…

“Lenara has a few suggestions about  how to strengthen your connection to the territory in addition to the State of the Territory Address.”

He didn’t like where this was going…Surprisingly, it didn’t go where he thought and consisted of Derek and the pack doing a sort of tour through the territory to soak his presence and give everyone some peace of mind.

“She did suggest having sex with the entire pack across the territory, but I think your presence and your nightly runs would suffice.”

Derek flushed. Leave it to Lenara to be completely inappropriate before he tells Stiles that he’ll think about it and moving on to the fact that he has a meeting with the fairies and can’t trust Jackson to tell him what he should and shouldn’t say.

Stiles grinned, “Just tell his royal highness to go and be a fairy.”

Derek tilts his head and hands over the agenda for the meeting. Stiles talk him through it, writes him notes and does his best not to laugh at the idea of Jackson trying to be a fairy ambassador.

“The man who is still so pissed off with being a fairy that he can’t do anything but kill plants?”

Derek nods slowly and asks if there was a way to fix that and get Jackson more comfortable with his faerie powers.

Stiles smiled, “Honestly? I want to tell you that Jackson will always be a failure at being a faerie because he’s such a prick… But in reality, Jackson just needs some faerie guidance.”

Derek can’t think of what that could possibly mean until he gets to the meeting and is surrounded by faeries in their mortal form: talking laughing, playing tricks, a community that’s warm and welcoming. He knows that Jackson’s parents are both Druid and hadn’t realized they’d adopted a faerie kid until he was in high school and then they never tried to bridge the gap between them being Druids and Jackson being a faerie. As far as Stiles knew, they’d never showed any sign of not resenting him being a faerie, and not getting Jackson the support he needed, that it became a sore spot for Jackson who did his best to be the best at everything and exist far outside the idea of “faerie”. All of that angst it showed in the use of his powers: they were haphazard at best and he still couldn’t fully control the shift to and from his faerie form and he couldn’t fly properly either.

“He’ll be fine,” Stiles told him before leaving. “Just tell him that it’s okay.”

Derek wasn’t sure what to do with that but seeing Jackson tense up and look exceedingly confused and terrified of the group, he understood. Jackson had never been around a group of faeries like this. Derek pats him on the back and tell him to go mingle before pushing him forward.

Immediately, he’s greeted by a young couple with smiles, offers of a drink and to show him around and introduce him as Derek finds the elder faeries and nods his greeting to them. The woman has dark wavy hair, the man does as well. Their eyes have the same quality as Jackson’s do when he’s truly happy. Derek supposed that it was just a faerie thing.

“Alpha Hale,” the woman greeted. “It’s so wonderful to meet you at last.”

“The honor is mine.”

“I see you brought someone with you. Is that Jackson?”

He tilted his head in curiosity, she laughed, “Stiles gave us forewarning of a faerie who need guidance.”

Derek nodded, “Yes, that’s him.”

She nodded and looked back to him, “Don’t worry. There are plenty who lose their way, but they can always be brought back with the proper amount of guidance. Please sit.”

Derek does so. The woman, Wyrwen, is actually a Queen of sorts as she is one of the eldest living faeries. Her husband, Marigon, was of noble blood, butt that hadn’t been the reason that they married. After discussing their concerns, Derek met their son and his wife, Miroa and Kaila, who had only just been returned home after a very long time in poacher’s grasp.

“Yes, we are very grateful to have them back,” Wyrwen said with a misty smile.

Kaila nods. She has the sort of smile that won’t reach her eyes before Jackson finds his way with a cup in hand, looking a little sheepish, to Derek’s side.

“Mingling?” Derek asked with a smile.

Jackson nodded and looked to the family. Wyrwen asks him to sit and broaches the idea of faery training.

“You’ve never been trained, have you dear?”

“No, mam.”

She nodded, of course not. Druids and faeries had a bit of a history and it no doubt burned his adoptive parents to no end that they had a son who had been made of the elements while they were made of dust.

“Tell me dear, have you tried to find your parents?”

Jackson swallowed and shook his head. He’d only found out a few years ago that he was adopted when he obviously could perform Druid magic and faery light started coming from his fingertips.  Wyrwen’s eyes grew soft and sad before perking up and asking for his hands.

“Perhaps we can at least take a peak. You were found in Texas you said?”

He nodded and offered her his hands. Her hands were warm, soft, maternal in their touch and Jackson felt nothing even as her hands began to glow. Her eyes widened and she withdrew her hands looking at him strangely before trying again. Again, there was a glow around their touching hands, but Jackson felt nothing.

Her hands went over her mouth at the word that slipped from her lips, but Jackson heard it.

Mithril…

Jackson frowned and felt something pulsing in his chest. Miroa and Kaila looked at Wyrwen and then to Jackson who began to shake. The pulsations growing stronger, the world getting farther away.

“Jackson?” Derek asked. Seeing the light growing beneath Jackson’s skin, pulsating and shaking him right off his chair.

“D-Derek,” he said panicked. Wyrwen floated over to kneel at his side, lift him and pull him close as the pulses grew stronger. Miroa, Kaila, and Marigon moved soon after, forming a small circle aroudn him and generating a warm circle of light.

The pulsations only grew stronger and something told Derek to step back as the room turned to take a look. Kaila had Jackson pulled against her tightly, her eyes wet with tears, stroking his hair and whispering to him. 

“I’m so sorry… we didn’t want to leave you…”

When the lights begin to fade, Jackson has taken on a different sort of glow, similar to Scott’s ever-present pixie dust. It was similar to the faeries in the room who all held that glow. He’d guessed it was just a faery thing, but Jackson had never had it before. 

His eyes were hazy looking up into the circle of faces who were partially sad, happy, and so warm he didn’t know what to do. He felt… light… really like. Like air, or the sea breeze, something that he couldn’t explain. 

“A water baby, I see,” Wyrwen said wryly. “You take after your grandfather in that regard.”

“What…?”

He said drowsily. “Happened…”

She kissed his forehead, “We have much to talk about Jackson, for now just take a deep breath and try to relax.”

He nodded. Relaxing sounded like a really good idea right now until he settled and stopped feeling like he was floating. He fell asleep soon after, his head in Kaila’s lap as she wiped her face and stroked his hair.

“He got most of his looks from my side of the family,” she said softly with a bitter laugh. “He’s grown up so handsomely…”

When Jackson wakes up, Derek tells him that he’ll be spending the rest of the week with the faeries and be attending what was officially faerie kid daycare to get him in control of his powers. As much as he wanted to protest, there was something tugging at him to make him not do so.

Derek announces to the rest of the Pack that Jackson will be with the faeries until further notice. Lydia does her best to look uninvolved but Derek catches her alone, placing a pulled pork sand which in her hands, with all the mango habanero sauce she ever wanted and smiles at her.

“He’ll be fine and yes, you can visit him. I’m sure they’d love to meet you.”

Lydia nodded slowly, escaping to their shared room to eat and probably to call Jackson to make sure he was okay. Other than a little disoriented, he sounded fine and promised to come see her so they could talk. For now, eat the sandwich, breathe, and try not to murder Aurora. 

That alone was easier said than done when she was here, but now that the Druid girl had been shipped off to the nearest emissary school, she was often too tired when she came back to cause much trouble: a fact that everyone was grateful for. 

It’s a full week before they see each other. They meet at a discreet dinner where they can both  order their secret indulgences without anyone they know seeing them. The sandwich is huge and dripping with sauce on her side of the table and the pound cake is warm enough to melt the four scoops of ice cream he has stacked on top of it. They hold hands across the table and Lydia waits for him to start talking. 

“I’ve found my real parents…”

Lydia smiles and nods at him to continue. He explains that he’s some sort of faerie prince, which he really doesn’t fully understand lineage wise, and that he’s been attending what was essentially faery daycare. 

“I’m serious, the second oldest is like two years old.”

“Are you learning?” Lydia asked.

He nodded, “Yeah…I am, I think… Don’t tell, Stiles that though.”

“Oh?”

“Yes, he’s been running the daycare since I’ve been there. The kids love him and I think he’s getting a serious kick out of it.”

Lydia laughed, “Serves you right for shoving him in lockers and things for four years straight.”

Jackson shrugged, “I regret nothing.”

Of course he didn’t, they ate in comfortable conversation and it almost felt like they were in high school, dating, escaping out of town to go where no one knew them… It was the same now, yet so much bigger it felt. When they were done, Jackson paid and lead her to his car, swinging their arms back and forth slowly.

“Things are getting heavy now aren’t they?” Lydia nodded, “Are they getting louder?”

Lydia nodded again with a sigh, “But don’t worry about me… worry about you, your Highness.”

He snorted at that and kissed her gently before opening the passenger door for her, “Funny.”

He drove her back to the Barracks, kissed her goodbye, and headed towards the Faeria side of town. He parked at the tree line and walked the rest of the way hearing Stiles’s voice speaking to excited children and feeling his stomach turn.

“Today,” Stiles said dramatically. “We’re learning to fly!”

The kids cheered, bouncing on the balls of their toes while Jackson did his best not to wince. He didn’t have the best track record with flying. When he shifted into that tiny sprite of thing, he could never control his wings. Instead, he flew haphazard crazy circles and ultimately ended up injuring himself and not going anywhere near where he wanted to go. 

Stiles had them line up and paired them up. His partner, a two year old by the name of Caru, looked up at him beaming.

“Don’t worry, Jackson,” she said. “I’ll look out for you.”

He almost cracked a smile at how adorably sincere she was. 

“Now, first it’s quiz time. How do faeries fly?”

Everyone’s hands shot up and he called on one of the younger students towards the front of the line.

“With their wings?”

“That’s right. And how do faeries call on their wings?”

“Happy thoughts!” A little girl cheered.

Stiles nodded, “That’s right. Happy thoughts. So I want everyone to close their eyes and think of the happiest moment of their lives. The moment you felt the lightest.”

Jackson closed his eyes trying to think of a moment. Lacrosse championship? No, there was victory but even that had felt tainted. Accepted into the Beacon Pack?... Not quite. He felt validated, not necessarily happy…

_You think I care?_

Jackson heard the words, angry words from Lydia’s lips as he hid beneath her bed, a tiny, winged, flickering red orb of light. It had been the second time he’d shifted, an instinct. The first had been in front of his parents after a particularly grueling conversation with them about his coming of age event. He’d failed completely, unable to do any of the magic they’d requested of him. He’d been damn near overwhelmed then.

In Lydia’s room, they’d argued. He was frustrated, taking it out on her. They’d both said things they shouldn’t have, things that were better left unsaid when again the wall broke. The world grew larger and Lydia stared at him like some impossible thing, wavering in the air, crashing into the walls whenever he tried to fly away, bouncing with shocks of light coming from him against the door, against the ceiling, until eventually he just crawled under bed and curled up in his shame.

_That’s what this is about? You’re a faerie? You think I’m dating you because you’re a druid? Are you fucking kidding me?_

She’d been so angry, but not at him. Her own parents were Druid. They’d seen it as a good match, as had his parents. 

_I’m not dating you because my parents like your parents, Jackson! Who gives a fuck about that? I’m dating you because I love you. That’s it._

She’d kneeled beside her bed to look at him, still flickering red in the shadow beneath her bed. Letting her eyes and hair go white and her lips turn black. The insides of her mouth a wet onyx: Banshee. 

_Unless it matters to you._

He’d crawled out then and they’d stared at one another. He felt himself growing larger and larger to his normal size and he couldn’t remember how long they sat there holding hands, staring at each other through the dark. Long after the white had faded to her usual ginger.

But that lightness was filling him now.

Stiles watched Jackson with interest. He had no worries about the kids who were all accustomed to sprouting their wings whenever. But Jackson, that would be telling. Flying would take some practice, but calling on wings, especially at his age, would be something different. If he shifted into the smaller form, Stiles knew that there would be a lot more work necessary before he could call his wings…

But then, Jackson surprised him. 

The glow of the faerie pulsed beneath his skin and he watched Jackson’s wings materialize knitting together cool blues and light into an ornate pair suitable to his size. They held the pattern of the American royal family and the color of seawater. 

He hadn’t expected Jackson to be a water child, but grinned. Good. There was some hope for the asshole yet.

“Awesome, let’s see some fluttering, don’t go flying just yet.”

Immediately, the kids’ wings fluttered yet Jackson seemed to be having difficulty with it. Stiles walked over to hear Caru coaching him.

“It’s like an extra limb that’s all. You gotta feel them.”

Jackson tried but he didn’t feel anything. Stiles approached with a grin.

“It’s different,” he said. “You have to maintain that lightness and give it direction.”

He ran a hand through the wings feeling them immaterial and watched Jackson shudder at the feeling.

“That’s the extra limb,” he said. “They’re an extension of your soul.”

Jackson shuddered again and tried. They twitched once, twice, and soon were flapping slowly. Caru cheered for him. 

“Good, now everyone up just off your feet.”

Caru floated easily and Jackson took a deep breath feeling his feet leaving the ground slowly and praying that he wouldn’t go crashing into anything. 

“Left,” they all moved, Jackson moved last. “Up a little more.”

Caru giggled with glee as the line rose highed. 

“Right, down.”

Jackson crashed to the ground falling back on his back as Caru floated down.

“Are you alright Jackson?”

He nodded painfully, but he was pretty sure his pride would take a while longer to recover.

“Alright, those are the basics, now we’re going to fly around for a little while.”

Stiles lifted into the air earning the kid’s gasps.

“How are you doing that?! You don’t have wings.”

He snorted and pressed a finger to his lips, “That’s a secret. Follow me.”

It was slow going as most of them had issues with constant flying and direction, including Jackson, but after a few times around. They seemed to be getting the hang of it. Caru, faithfully stuck by Jackson’s side no matter how he wavered and how advanced of a flyer she was. 

By the end of the day, Jackson was sure he’d sleep for a week while the kids seemed to share mostly the same sentiment. When their parents came to pick them up, they were grateful, taking their children home and Jackson lay splayed on the ground trying to stay awake.

“You alright?” Stiles ask sitting down beside him with two bottles of Gatorade: a blue and a clear one.

“So… tired… how are you… not?”

“Practice,” he said. “You did pretty good, Jackson. Keep it up and you’ll be a certified faerie in no time.”

“I… didn’t know that faeries weren’t supposed to shrink.”

Stiles nodded, “Not many people do.”

Jackson blew out a breath, “A child had to look out for me.”

“Caru cares about people. She’s a total leader. You shouldn’t feel bad, it’s just her personality.”

“Except I’m twenty-two and I’m only just learning how to fly.”

“Better now than never,” Stiles replied offering him the clear Gatorade. “Drink up, it’ll help. I’d suggest you getsome sugar in your system.”

“Sugar?”

“Faeries, like pixies, recharge faster on sugar. It’s comforting for them.”

Jackson said nothing, “Don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Stiles didn’t believe him for a second, but handed him a slice of butter cake, still warm  before standing. 

“I’ve got to clean up, eat up and get some rest.”

He leaves Jackson there staring at the cake. His parents had an absolute “No Sweets” policy in their house. Through all the class birthday parties, he’d been the odd one out, confined to an apple instead of apple pie, crackers instead of cake, and any other alternative that the teacher had been kind enough to provide. The first time he’d had something sweet was in high school, right before he’d started dating Lydia. They’d known each other since they were kids, their parents being Druids and all, and spent a lot of time around one another. It had been an accident really. It looked like a cracker, but it was actually a sugar cookie. 

He’d never forget the soul-deep warmth he’d felt at the first taste. And the second, and the third… The whole container had been finished in a matter of seconds. Lydia had said nothing about it, but offered hers as well. 

_We’ll keep it a secret_ , she’d said with a wink as he washed it all down with chocolate milk. 

He’d slept so well that night he almost missed class the next day. When he got his car, it became a thing to sneak out of the city, out of the territory to go to a bakery and order cookies… then cake, and milkshakes and any other sweet thing that Lydia could convince him to try. Sweet tea and barbecue had become a favorite when he’d found out that the oh-so refined Lydia liked to keep in touch with her Tennessee blood and have pulled pork sandwiches dripping with sweet barbecue sauce and mango habanero sauce. The loaded fries topped with bacon, blue cheese, onion, and more pulled pork… They’d taken comfort in having those secrets together. 

It felt odd now, openly eating cake… not hiding in his car in his slumming clothes…hiding around building corners and alleys like some kind of criminal. 

But then the warmth was there, filling him and making him feel more energized, lighter. He walked to his car and drove to the main faery house to collapse into bed, more tired, and lighter than he’d been in a while.  
The weeks carry on like that with Jackson learning how to be a faerie completely, meeting up with Lydia as often as he could to talk, for strength and sanity. He’s managed to fly from the training compound to the Barracks and back when he runs into his adoptive parents while on patrol. Officially graduated from faerie day care, he was back to his normal scheduled programming, only now floating with direction along the edge of Beacon Hills city. They appeared as he reached a part of the city’s land farthest from the city, somewhere in the heart of the forest. The two who’ve raised him all his life, saved his life in some way, looking at him as some impossible thing. 

“Hello,” he said. His wings still fluttering a bit even as he stood perfectly still.

They watch them nervously, like he’d grown another head and looked at Jackson. 

“Hello,” Martha said stiffly, “You… haven’t been home.”

Jackson nodded slowly, “I met my birth parents.”

They blinked and glanced between one another before looking back to Jackson.

“I see… are you staying with them?”

“For now,” he said. “I’ll go back to the Barracks once my training is done.”

“Training?”

“Yes,” he said with a wry grin. “Faeries aren’t supposed to shrink.”

They swallowed and something in him told him that they knew that. That they knew that something had been deeply wrong with him and they hadn’t thought to help.

“You’re staring,” Jackson said softly watching the way their eyes stared at his wings. “Why?”

“It’s just… we’ve never seen you like this…”

Jackson swallowed, his stomach turning, something in him telling him to run. But these were his parents, the man and woman who’d raised him…Esteemed members of the druid community…

Now that he thought about it… how could they not know that he was a faerie? Shouldn’t they have been able to sense it? He took a step back. They took on forward, eyes still trained on his wings. 

More than that… no sugar? For him… when his cousins had been allowed all the sugar they wanted…

He took another step back as they stepped forward and he watched their eyes watching his wings.

“ _You knew_ ,” he whispered all too softly dodging back as they sprang forward grabbing and wrestling him down to the ground. His wings folded beneath him, his father’s knee on his throat, his mother sitting on his chest digging for a vial. It was thick glass covered in runes.

“Hold him still!”

“I’m trying damnit!”

Jackson screamed at the first surge of the incantation and the vial. Whatever she was planning to do wasn’t motherly. He screamed and screamed as he felt it tugging at his wings at the seam where they attached to his body as immaterial as they were. 

“Hurry up!”

She went on chanting as he struggled and writhed, crying out for help and all of a sudden it stopped, he choked on nothing and watched the vial fill with the light he’d only just begun to explore. His hand reached out for it as he shook and they stood over him. 

“Got them,” she said looking down at Jackson. “It’s for the best Jackson.”

He shook, choking, his blood running cold and the world getting darker and darker. He registered someone growling, someone screaming and Lydia….

Lydia crying, gathering him up and rocking him, “Jackson? Jackson baby wake up. Wake up…”

He didn’t move, hearing her, but unable to move, unable to speak feeling as though he was trapped in a ball made of glass and screaming, banging on the solid walls.

_Let me out!_

_Let me out!_

*

“For god’s sake call someone!” Lydia shrieked as they got Jackson, ice cold and still, on Lenara’s table. She shook her head, this wasn’t good. 

“What the hell happened?” Derek roared coming, having been called soon after Scott and Lydia arrived. Martha and David had been detained and the glowing orb they’d been holding was in Scott’s hand, but it wouldn’t open, it wouldn’t break. There was nothing they could do. 

Lenara felt sick swallowing thickly and telling Derek to sit down, red eyes and all. Scott explained that Stiles had given him a call to check on Jackson. To make sure that he wasn’t alone. When he’d told him that Jackson was on patrol tonight, Stiles had all but ordered him to go after him. Scott hadn’t understood but did as asked. Lydia had come with him and they’d gotten there just in time to see Martha finish the incantation and Jackson’s body to go eerily still.

“They’ve taken his soul,” Lenara said with a crushing finality, she took the vial from Scott’s hand. “It’s an old incantation to steal a faery’s soul, their wings, their light essentially. He’ll die without it.”

“How long do we have?” Scott asked. 

Lenara shook her head, “It’s impossible to say, depends on how quickly a faery can get here to undo it.”

“Why would someone do this?” Lydia asked, “His own parents…”

“Faerie light is a manifestation of a faery's soul, the same is true of their wings. As it's raw power, it has the power to enhance a Druid's powers greatly... at a cost of course. If you trap it correctly, it could be used as a very high impact bomb. One faery’s soul captured could destroy a territory as large as Beacon Hills… more than that, the improper release of one could bring down any barrier….”

Derek went still and looked at Lenara, “You mean to tell me that they adopted Jackson, brought him here, and waited all this time to undo the barrier?”

“It’s a possibility,” she said. “It would at the very least weaken the barrier significantly. If I had to guess, they worked for the actual  Darach and potentially the Council.”

“How could the Barrier have let them through?”

Lenara shook her head, “The barrier is relatively new. It was put up after they came here. The original plan was probably to rally the Druids to take over Beacon Hills, or worse destroy everyone and have a brand new territory all to themselves. Or maybe, they’re just poachers… There’s no telling with the Darach followers. It could have simply have been a test of loyalty.”

Derek tilted his head looking at Lenara in curiosity. How did she know so much about the Darach? What were they and why on earth did they want to destroy Beacon Hills if that was their plan. 

Those questions would have to wait.

Lydia shook her head, “What do we do?”

She continued to stroke Jackson’s forehead and speak to him in soft tones meant to keep him calm, maybe keep herself calm as well. Her hair was turning white at the roots, her lips and mouth darkening with her panic.

“We wait for the faeries to get here,” Lenara said. “This isn’t a spell a Druid can undo…. Unless you’d like us to blow up.”

Derek wanted to punch something and in all honesty planned on doing just that. Scott’s phone rang and he lifted it to his ear.

“Stiles! I don’t know how you knew, but we didn’t make it in time. They put his light or something in a… what… uh… yeah… okay.”

He began rummaging in his pockets finding pieces of candy a lollipop and other hard candies to shove into his mouth before taking Jackson’s other hand.

“This isn’t going to do anything funny to him is it? I don’t want him punching me in the face later….”

Scott let out a breath and his hand began to sparkle and glow. The glow began to spread into Jackson’s skin, up his arm and straight to his chest. The door opened with Kira and Isaac to announce that Wyrwen and Kaila were on their way. 

“What are you doing?” Lydia asked Scott who was biting into a Reese’s and shaking himself awake. 

“Running out of candy…” Scott said. 

Dasha went to the kitchen to grab whatever she could find, raiding the chocolate stash, the sugar, and candy to keep Scott stocked. Scott could produce Pixie dust for an extensive amount of time, but there was of course of a limit but the longer he could manage, the better off Jackson would be in theory.

“What are you doing?”

“Faerie light substitute…” Scott groaned, “It’s supposed to help…”

Wyrwen and company arrived almost ten minutes later in the middle of another round of sugar into Scott’s mouth. He was beginning to pale, but at least Jackson was still breathing. Wyrwen and Kaila came closer. 

Wyrwen took the vial from Lenara with a glare and brushed past her, “ _The world is cursed…_ ”

Lenara only swallowed and drifted away from the group who’d crowded around Jackson. Derek watched on divided between Wyrwen and Kaila at Jackson's side, coaxing the light from the jar and Dasha and Lenara's conversation. 

_Are you okay?_

_I’m fine…_

Jackson screamed, the sound ringing through the house as the light filled the room and pulsed. Jackson’s body lay still, the natural glow returning slowly to his skin and Scott collapsed to the ground.

“So much… sugar…”

Kira only shook her head. Jackson began to come round and Derek slipped outside to see Dasha and Lenara rocking on the swing, singing a song into the breeze. 

Derek settled against the railing and waited as Lenara took a deep breath before looking at him.

“You going to explain?”

Lenara gave a wry smile, “You know the rule.”

Derek nodded, “Why did she say the world is cursed when she saw you?”

Lenara smiled and sat back, “Wyrwen and I have a history… We faced each other in the war. Her battalion attacked my family… I lost everything…I joined the Darach.”

Derek nodded. He’d heard of them, the dark Druids who wanted everything, to take the world and everything in it.  
Before she’d joined, she’d been the top student, doing research on faerie light’s effects on illnesses. She’d meant to help people to see if perhaps Druid and Faeries could find something that could unite them. That had changed when the group she’d been contracted to work with killed everyone at the turn of the War and had nearly killed her too. She went to the Darach and told them everything that she knew about faeries in exchange that they would help her find the ones who’d destroyed her life.

“I was angry.  Vengeful, things that Druids really shouldn’t be in general… I killed a lot of people. We met again and I watched them take a faery’s light… I left. That wasn’t what I signed up for. Killing in the act of war is one thing… drinking faery souls is another.”

He frowned, “Drinking?”

“With a nice wine,” Lenara said wryly.

“I was young,” she said with a wry smile. “Around thirty or so… a baby… I didn’t, couldn’t know any better… Know that he was using me for something far more sinister than war. I was lonely and he said all the right things… you know how that goes.”

She stood and turned towards the night sky, hearing Jackson screaming inside. She thinks of that night, of that poor faerie girl screaming as  Heathclif ripped her soul from her body.

“I dissented obviously. I signed up for revenge—not poaching.”

Derek frowned as she went on and turned around, crossing her arms. For her research, she’d developed a method of containing faerie light so she could study its properties. She’d only been using it to hold small vials full to be used, but the man in charge of the Darach at the time had seen a greater application for it. He convinced her to create larger vessels to trap power for their spells. Lenara didn’t, knowing the danger a larger vessel could pose and began to question him.

Rather than wait for the vessel to be complete, he took the incomplete spells and pulled a captured faeries soul from them, drinking them in and taking their power.

“You must understand that faerie light, is more than just power, but their soul… When took that soul into himself… he did something irreversible… unexplainable.”

It had changed him, changed the direction of his warpath. It was clear that there was no room for her revenge when they all saw what a faery’s soul could do for their power and their longevity.

“Druids… have always wanted to live forever.” She said wryly.  “In any case, I couldn’t stand behind poaching. I destroyed all my research and ran. They caught me. Tried to kill me, threw me down a cliff after trying to pull the information from my head and realizing that they wouldn’t be able to.”

She almost laughed at the pain now. How they’d tortured her, raped and beat her to no avail. How even captured, beaten and bloody, she was stronger than the fools who tried to escape their own mortality by sucking the souls out of living creatures.

Monsters, she’d called them before they shot a hole larger than a fist through her chest and she fell over the edge of a cliff.

“Funny thing about mixed children…”

Derek froze, “You’re mixed?”

Lenara turned and laughed, “Yes. I am. I didn’t know it until I woke up though.”

Druids had dark secrets in their blood, things that they didn’t like to speak of, mistakes, and curses mingling in their blood. With such close contact with magic, it only took a few dips to the wrong side for something to taint the blood. Her grandmother wanted children so badly, that she made a deal. Offering the life and soul of one of her future offspring, if she could only have one.

She had twelve children as a result and all but one died before they were five years old. The world had a funny way of punishing you for your foolish desires. That woman, Lenara’s mother, had three children, including Lenara.

“I’d never understood why I felt treated so differently. I thought it was just because, as Meredith used to say, I looked like a throwback.”

In reality, she bore the mark of the contract: her dark hair and curves that never ended. Meredith, her mother, kept her practically locked away. It was her sister that freed her and taught her about the world. Lenara discovered sex about three weeks before her husband was killed.

“We’d only been married for a few weeks,” she said with a sad smile. “He was a good man. His parents were terrible people though. “

Derek snickered at that, “So what’s the other half?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” Lenara asked, leaning against the banister and letting their eyes meet. There’s a glow to her eyes that he can’t quit name and Derek isn’t sure why, but he feels… hot… bothered—Oh.

“Funny thing about succubi, people think it’s a biological thing, when in reality it’s all spiritual. Longevity, good looks, apparent indestructibility, never have a child, all for the simple price of sex multiple times a week.”

“Not a bad deal,” Derek said wryly. “This explains so much.”

“Doesn’t it?”She laughed. “Essentially, my druid-human side just wasn’t strong enough. Obviously, I had a hole through me. My succubus instincts and traits took over. I went through my awakening in about… three days.”

“Is that good?”

“It’s supposed to take years.”

Derek nodded. Lenara laughed. She’d ran into a faerie, patrolling his borders and fucked him so out of his mind that he wasn’t even sure if he was still alive. Her wounds closed and she’d made her way into town. Faerie, druid, lycan, whatever… for three days, the bar was turned into a sex den. Her druid side had all but died out and she’d awakened to full succubi essentially while retaining her ability to perform magic.

“The man I’d fucked silly in the forest was brought back to town sometime after the orgy and before I woke up… But he recognized me.”

He was confused, because hell… a well-known druid warrior had fucked him senseless and slept through an entire tavern of people within three days. Seeing her there, had probably shocked what little sense he had left. She gave him the name “Lenara”, discarding her old one and for a time she lived in piece. Sure, she was basically the town whore, but at the very least all of her sensibilities were appeased.

“Until… things happened…”

The premonitions came back a month later, they were persistent even when she was in the middle of riding someone into oblivion… She saw the great binding circle that Heathcliff had strung together being drawn, hundred of thousands faery lights drawn out of bodies and drank by Druids… She went directly to the nearest faerie settlement to warn them.

“Why?”

“Call it a warrior’s honor,” she said.

Taking faerie light doesn’t kill them immediately, instead they become human in body and shells of their former selves.

“What they were planning wasn’t war it was poaching en masse.”

Derek nodded, that could definitely make it worse. At least in war there was peace in death. In poaching there was no peace at all.

“They tried to kill me,” she said wryly.

They  were a small battalion who only recognized her as the warrior who’d murdered thousands of faeries on her own.

“I was a badass back before my name was Lenara,” she said with a nod.

They insisted that Druids were not clever enough to do so. The Darach cast the spell that night and she’d thrown herself in the nexus of it to stop it.

“They…took your soul?”

“No,” she said. “Funny thing about a trapping spell like that…”

“Are you secretly in a bottle somewhere?”

“No… the spell essentially means to hold your peace unless asked for. I can say frivolous things, but anything of value I have to be asked. I thought it was rather fitting as my volunteering information is what started it all.”

Derek finally understood the rule that Lenara reminded them of.

“But… Sometimes you don’t even answer the question.”

“Oh, I can refuse to. I did create the spell. Any faerie trapped in a bottle can refuse to be called, but they have no chance of escape, I have no way to answer questions, that go unanswered. It’s still my choice on whether if, how, or why I answer a question. I designed the original ones to ensure that the faerie light I was receiving to study was given by choice.”

Derek nodded, “They still blame you for a magic to still be out there like that?”

Lenara nodded, “And rightfully so—”

“No,” Derek cut in. “It wasn’t your fault. That’s on the Darach’s hands, on whoever that guy is hand’s not yours. You did everything you could. You did what you thought was right.”

Lenara smiled at him, “Careful lover boy, I may actually have to cash in that coupon.”

Derek snorted and when Kira came out to tell them that Jackson was awake and alive they came in to see Lydia curled up against him and them both covered in one of Lenara’s thick “Comfort Me Please” blankets.

“How are you feeling?” Derek asked.

Jackson nodded, “G-Good… considering… What happened?”

“They pulled your soul from your body and put it in a magic vessel,” Wyrwen said tersely. “It’s an ancient relic from the time of the war. How many more of these are floating around?”

Lenara nodded picking up the old vessel and looking at it, reading the runes, “Hard to say. It isn't an original. It’s not an original.”

Wyrwen glared at her, “And of course you would know wouldn't you?”

“I do,” Lenara said calmly. “Since I am the original.”

Her eyes widened she looked at Lenara, to her chest and then back to her face as Lenara turned.

“I’ll look into it, there’s a different matrix here that could be troublesome in the future. For now, rest up Jackson. Dasha, could make him something warm, sweet preferably.”

“Sex-Apple Pie in a Cup Coming up! A la mode?”

Jackson blinked and nodded, watching Dasha float past to the kitchen. Derek wondered, not for the first time, what Dasha actually was.

"What... is a Dasha?"

“She’s a special one,” Lenara said wryly examining the glyphs on the vessel. “Curses, bloodline, blood feuds, torture… she’s been through a lot.”

Derek nodded and accepted a cup of liquid that did in fact smell like apple pie a la mode. Jackson hummed happily at the taste it and practically sagged against Lydia, too tired to stay awake much longer.

“Get some sleep Jackson,” Derek said, passing a hand over his head soothingly. “You too, Lyds.”

She nodded and Derek got them both settled on the couch. Wyrwen and Kaila stayed close for a little while longer but eventually left. Lenara sat at the dining room table staring at the vessel like some monster who’d she’d thought she’d murdered and strewn across a battlefield in pieces.

“Hey,” Dasha started, sliding into Lenara’s lap and setting the vessel aside. “Come to bed?”

Lenara chuckled, “Is this a stop brooding request?”

“It’s a let me hold you request actually.”

Her lips twitched to a sad smile before nodding. She locks the vessel away and follows Dasha upstairs, undress and shift until she’s taller, broader, her chest flatter, her jaw squarer, eyes bright as moonlight. Lenara snorts a bit as Dasha draws her against this new form.

“Hello, you.”

Lenara told the handsome face gently. Dasha smiles at her kisses her tenderly and turns her towards the bed. She heard herself moan and felt something crack as they tumbled back onto the large bed. Dasha had insisted that they get a large enough bed for the two of them which truly meant large enough for at least three sets of them, but Lenara didn’t mind. Especially when he looked at her like that.

“I thought this was a request to hold me,” Lenara said a little breathless as he tugged at the collar of her shirt and nipped at the skin of her neck.

“It is,” he said, the spritely sound of Dasha’s day voice gone beneath the rumbling depth of the night. “But holding you tenderly won’t get that look off your face… nor make you stop hurting.”

Lenara turned her head looking towards the window, “And don’t you dare say you don’t know what I’m talking about.”

Lenara instead said nothing.

“ _Alaia,_ ” he whispered against her skin and she gasped.

How long had it been since anyone had called her that? She’d almost forgotten it entirely and looked at Dasha.

“You did everything you could,” He said. “Don’t torture yourself further. What Heathcliffe has done in the past years, does not fall on you.”

She shook her head, wanting to escape to wallow in her own guilt for just a little longer, to pay penance, but he wasn’t having it. He pinned her down calling iron vines from their bedpost to twirl around her wrists to hold her still, settling his weight on her hip so she couldn’t move and looked down at her.

“Be good for me,” he said, drawing a hand over his awakening  cock and stroking slowly. Her eyes closed, feeling the tug and hunger rising.

“Be good for me, Alaia.” He said, his breath getting choppy as he worked himself into hardness and stared down at her.

He watched the shudder of her body, the tell-tale twitch that she was resisting. All the signs that said I can’t.

“You  can’t torture yourself like this,” he said. “It’s been months since you’ve fed and I’ve let you do this to yourself, but no longer. Be good for me and let go.”

She thrashed, wriggling beneath him, fighting it, but he knew it wouldn’t take long. It never did when she waited so long to feed. He’d let her go partially because of the nightmares… but also forcing her would have done no good. She would have rejected it, made it worse. But the gloom and darkness had reached the pinnacle as far as he concerned. If he didn’t, she’d never forgive herself for what would happen.

“Be good for me, Alaia.”

Her eyes flickered and she panted her resistance before her eyes came to fall on him, on his hand getting slicker with the precum he drew from the tip of his cock. That sucubi violet beamed at him through the night. She licked her lips, wetting them and he watched her breathe the energy he produced in deep and shudder.

“You… smell… good…”

He smiled, “Want a taste?”

A whimper escaped her and she tugged at the restraints. He moved forward to slide his cock in her mouth and stroke slowly.

“Good, Alaia,” Dasha gasped and groaned, sliding his hand through her hair, guiding her in the way that felt best for him. “Just to take the edge off and then I’ll let you up, okay? I’ll give you anything, alright?”

Her eyes looked up at him and the pull of her mouth grew tighter, hotter, more desperate. He felt her practically trembling beneath him. He’d let her go too long, far too long. Maybe too long for the both of them, he wanted her to touch him, to do all the degrading, murderous, sexy things she had in mind, but if they didn’t take the edge off, they may have killed each other.

“You could come just like this couldn’t you? With me fucking your mouth?”

The answering moan told him it was going to be a rough night. It was best, more than likely if he locked the stairs and put the “Closed” sign up for now. With a thought in that direction, he swallowed thickly and began to thrust against the back of her throat until the glowing violet of her eyes grew brighter and he felt her drawing the energy from him, shaking as she came and drank deeply. His orgasm felt like an aftershock of that as he continued to fuck her mouth through her orgasm.

When he pulled free, she spoke, low and promising, “I’m going to ruin you.”

He shuddered at the words as he undid the iron around her wrists. All of a few second later, he was on his back and she was above him, tied down with pure magic and Lenara standing over him, undressing slowly. He only smiled at her.

“There you are.”

She licked her lips, trailing a finger down his chest, “Here I am.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 7\. You are an emissary truly. lit. You truly tame stars.  
> 8\. Only figuratively and not quite. lit. Only in spirit and not yet.  
> 9\. I, as the right and left hand of leaders, as the pillar and anchor of territory, do swear on my life's blood to honor that sacred office which I have accepted.  
> *I got lazy. For the hell of it, Wiccan = Old English... and it's probably badly translated too. I'm a little rusty.
> 
> P.S.
> 
> More on Dasha’s thing later, promise. I hadn’t planned that one… it just sort of happened. This whole chapter just sort of happened honestly. It seems as I explore the world I find that my story wants a new twist that just wasn’t in the cards before. It’s nice to know a little more about Lenara though.


	11. The Meaning of Asylum

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Golden Dragons, Aurora, hellhounds and why does dark ectoplasm stain so badly?

When Jackson wakes up, he admittedly feels better. Lydia stirs and sits up to see him , to touch him, to make sure he’s okay. Lenara and Dasha don’t seem to be around, so they leave a note and leave the house. They hear the door click locked behind them and continue down the street. Derek is driving towards them. He gets out of the car and hugs them both tightly.

“How are you two?”

Jackson nods, “A little… shaken up, but good.”

Derek nods and tells them to get into the car and he’ll drive them to the Barracks. Their cars were already back in their usual parking spaces at the loft.

“Scott even gave them a pixie once over.”

Jackson smiled wryly and nodded, “Did he… give me some sort of… pixie injection or something?”

“Yeah, replacement faery light is how he explained it. Are you feeling okay?”

Jackson nodded, he was feeling fine… He just wanted to be sure that the warmth and earthy, grounded feeling he’d had while out was what he thought it was… He'd felt as if the earth had taken hold of him and refused to let him float away. But if he kept Jackson alive all that time… without his own faery light to help…

“How is he?”

Derek smirked, “Asleep still. He pushed himself a little too hard, but he should be just fine.”

Jackson nodded slowly. He didn’t think that , given their history, Scott would have done that for him. When they manage the stairs up to their floor and crawl into bed, Lydia asks him if he wants to talk about it.

“I… don’t really know what to say, but it seems like I owe Scott a very large thank you.”

Lydia moved to be closer to him with a smile, “I’m sure you’ll think of something.”

And he did as awkward as it was. He told Kira that he was kidnapping her boyfriend for a thank you and took Scott to a bakery he’d been planning to go to, but had never done so. It was owned by a family of pixies, so he had no doubt that they had the best sweets available.

“Order anything you want, it’s on me.”

Scott’s jaw dropped, “Jackson it’s not—”

“Just order, Scott,” Jackson huffed. “I think saving my life is worth a few thousand dollars in sweets.”

Scott flushed, “I’ve never eaten that much sugar at one time except for the other day.”

Jackson only laughed and shook his head. Scott ordered as Jackson’s eyes flickered across the display case before stopping on the pound cake they’d placed in the heated display case. It was fresh, still hot from the oven.

“And a slice of that cake… like a faerie slice, yeah. All cake needs ice cream, yes.”

Jackson pays for it all and they tell him that it’ll be brought to their table, a big number 5 hovering above their heads as they sit. Scott regards Jackson across the table with the sort of attention that makes him slightly uncomfortable.

“I see.”

“What?” Jackson asked.

“The disappearance of all the vanilla ice cream…”

Jackson frowned, his cheek heating.

“I was wondering why Derek had started buying as I prefer strawberry, Lydia doesn’t eat ice cream, and everyone else doesn’t really like double vanilla.”

“I don’t know what—”

“And the pound cakes that Derek has been making…”

Jackson doesn’t look at him as Scott grins, “Don’t worry dude, you’re a faery, it’s okay to eat sweets.”

“I don’t.”

Scott rolled his eyes, “This isn’t high school bro. You’re a respected member of the Beacon Hills Pack and a faerie. No one’s going to freak out if you’re eating sweets you know?”

“Cake gentlemen,” the young girl who’d taken the order said. The bowls were huge, filled with cake and four scoops of ice cream.  She winked at Jackson and handed him a spoon.

“We’re like distant cousins dude,” Scott said beginning to eat. “We know.”

Jackson swallowed looking around, squirming even as the smell of the monstrosity before him was calling him, stroking all the frayed hurting nerves from the betrayal. He dragged his spoon through one side of the vanilla topped cake, through the cake base and took a hesitant bite.

Scott’s eyes widened watching the rush of light beneath the other’s skin that flickered and went out, the flush in his cheeks  and the look in his eye.

“When… did you first eat sweets?” Scott asked a little concerned.

“High school… sugar cookie,” he said between another spoon and another rush of light and flush.

“High school?” Scott asked. “That’s terrible! We have to fix this. Continue eating, please. Sprinkle more sugar, eat some sugar packets… Something!”

Jackson did his best to give him a flat look, but it didn’t work.  He was just so… warm. As the other things came to the table, Scott demanded that he eat at least half of all the plates. Soon, it was just a dull glow beneath his skin which was a lot better than before. They leave the bakery and go to another and another, so when they return laughing. Lydia can only smile at the healthy faerie glow beneath Jackson’s skin.

“Welcome to the family!” Scott said happily. “You’ve officially eaten several times your weight in sugar. How do you feel?”

Jackson nods thoughtfully, “Good… strange enough.”

It’s hard not to laugh as Scott becomes a constant reminder that he’s a faerie and that’s okay… To think Scott, screwy, crazy, Scott would not only save his life but guide him towards being okay with what he is… More than that…. Stiles…? Being an instructor for faery daycare? An emissarial consultant of an extremely high rank?

What kind of twilight zone did he step into?

The door swung open behind him to reveal Aurora with her suitcase and a smile.

“I thought you were…”

“It’s the end of the Semester.”

It dawns on Jackson that yes she’d been there for more than just a few months and yes it was nearing that festive time of year, so yes… she was out of school.

Ah, Jackson thought .There it was. The assurance that he was very much in reality.

*

Aurora is back for a week before it happens. Stiles is out of town and more importantly, she still hasn’t learned that she knows nothing. It’s Charlie that tells them that Aurora has only completed the introductory courses and will still need several years worth of training… that and the Council had bumped her up two levels even though she didn’t have the knowledge to back that move.

Erica has taken to eating a lot of fried chicken covered in hot sauce across the table from Boyd with his lobster rolls and clam chowder. Derek has kept Aurora at his side to keep her out of trouble, but more often than not, had her helping Charlie with any paper and office work that she needed.  He’s out on patrols when his phone rings: it’s Melissa’s number.

“Melissa?”

“Stiles actually, from Melissa’s phone. I’m with her and Boyd now.”

“What happened?”

Aurora watches Derek’s expression go from worried to slightly calmer, “Have you any idea what happened?... Yeah… okay. That’s fine. I’m on patrol. Aurora is with me. .. That’s… hold on. There’s someone on the line.”

“Derek!”

He turns to see Scott and Kira racing towards them, “What’s wrong?”

He answered the phone to hear Erica’s voice, “Derek…”

He frowned, “Erica? What’s wrong? Where are you?”

Her voice cuts out, getting weaker and farther away and Derek strains his ear to hear the sound of footsteps.

“You touch her and I’ll fucking kill you! Hey! Hey!”

The line goes dead and Derek takes off into the forest, trying to follow her scent, but there’s something dark in the air. Scott and Kira can feel it, Aurora stays close as Derek chases the faint and fading scent of Erica through the woods. He stops all at once and pushes everyone down as the burst of light goes flying overhead. There’s a roar that’s more twisted than anything he’s ever heard and more flashes of light above their heads. Screaming and angry things that sound like pure rage and fire.

Dragon.

At the sound of large wings and fiery screeching, he reaches for Scott’s hand to reassure him and finds that he’s shaking, his hand cold in Derek’s as he squeezes. Derek can feel the tingle of grey pixie dust beginning and squeezes a little tighter hoping that Scott can keep it together just a little longer… but if Scott is shaking this badly, it means that he’s seen the dragon and there is a dragon in the territory and that is no good.

In the dark of the night, he can only see figures in cloaks, slicing through the air attacking other larger figures that roar and twist as they fight. He can see a great body with wings moving quick and skilled, blasting some creature until it something gives out a howl and falls still to the ground in the midst of their fighting.

Slowly, Derek rises first, careful to look around and then back into the darkness where figures still lurk. The others stand and the smell of Erica is nearer, his eyes narrow looking into the dark, looking for her, but all he can see is darkness, as if there was  shadow cast over the area.

“I don’t want to get eaten,” Scott chanted, a shaking mess as a pair of eyes rose higher and Derek looked up into the eyes of a red scaled dragon. “Don’t want to be eaten.”

Derek squeezes his hands tighter as its mouth opens. He knows Kira could deflect some of the fire, maybe absorb some of it, but it wouldn’t be enough to save them all from the blast. There’s the sound of running footsteps again. Friend or foe he couldn’t tell, but people on foot was something that Kira could deal with.

“Aurora, now would be a good time to do some defensive magic.” Kira said looking around them. They’re surrounded, the dragon before them planning to blast them into nothing with the light in its mouth and Scott is fully in the middle of his nightmares, shaking and barely managing to stand with how badly he’s trembling.

Shit, how bad had that incident been that it’s reduced him to this.

“Scott,” Kira tried gently. “Baby, it’s okay. No one’s going to eat you.”

But Scott can’t hear her, can only feel the way he’s being tossed around and against boulders, pulverized, beaten, broken down--easier to digest… the slow burn of dragon fire against his skin, the talon in his shoulder.

“Uhm… right… I…”

“You can do that much can’t you?” Kira asked, taking Scott’s other hand and squeezing.

“I-I… uhm.. .I…”

“Well?”

“No!” she wailed. “I don’t know how!”

Fucking figures, Derek thought swallowing thickly as the dragon’s mouth began bleed an angry red through the bright white. He smelled blood and he wasn’t sure where it was coming from, but he also smelled Erica’s blood and that meant he couldn’t just leave. She was out here.

Probably afraid, injured at the least, and he wouldn’t leave her alone.

“Run,” he said. “Back to town.”

“What about you?”

“Just go, Kira. Take Scott and Aurora. I have to find Erica.”

“We can’t see anything!” Aurora shrieked,hyperventilating as she shrieked. “They’re going to kill us. They’re going to kill us.”

“Cgrisas1,” a voice says, soft and calm.

Footsteps march through the darkness and Derek turns seeing Stiles wearing a new red hooded shirt and vest combination. His gauntlets have been replaced by wristbands made of cured vines of some kind and he walks towards them with his eyes on the dragon. His hood is up, casting a deep shadow over his face. He stands in front of Derek, squaring his shoulders to gaze into the dragon’s probing eyes.

The dragon in question is not preparing to attack. The glow would stun them on impact, make them answer questions, but that was about it. It was a safety precaution against enemies… one he knew specifically from a band of dragon in Greenland.

“Cgrisas,” he says again. “ji n’wriek2.”

He raised a hand forward and the dragon tilted his head towards his open palm before nudging it gently and dispelling the maelstrom in its mouth.

“There we are,” he said with a smile. “Ril Alpha Hale dan Beacon Hills Korv’t.3”

The dragon rumbled and began to shift smaller, to vanish with the shadows around them as Stiles turned to the rest of the darkness.  Figures step forward  into the clearing as the darkness disappears. There are at least forty of them in the circle, all wearing those familiar cloaks of that dragon band.

Greenland was a long way away from Beacon Hills.

“Tak hav-or ki?”4

“Asylum,” a woman’s voice said as she stepped forward. “We beg asylum.”

Derek’s eyes widened to see Erica on one of their backs, unconscious, but grasping her phone, and breathing. He looked to Stiles as his eyes scanned over the group and pulled down his hood. There is a gasp.

“Stiles,” a voice gasps and steps forward to hug him tightly.

He smiles, “Crigsas, tak qar.”5

Derek watches on partially confused as the two speak in low tones. Scott’s legs have officially given out, his eyes staring into nothing as Kira wraps her arms around him, stroking his hair and speaking softly to him.

“It’s okay,” she said. “You’re safe. Everything is alright now.”

Derek watched Stiles and the woman speak for a while longer before Stiles turns to him.

“They came from Greenland. They’ve been traveling for a long time and they’re in need of asylum.” He explained, “Also, a larger hole has appeared on the South side of the territory, big enough for a few hav-kar to get through. They’re exceedingly hard to kill.”6

“What the hell are harggrar?” Kira asked and Stiles only smiled at her pronunciation.

“Hellhounds in English,” Stiles said and kneeled by Scott who still looked out into nothing.

It had been the same way then too, Scott hadn’t said anything for hours after the incident even when his mother had come and held him tightly. Kira was stroking his hair, talking to him but it wouldn’t be enough. Scott was in his memories now and the only way to wake him up would be to jab his pixie core. Stiles pokes him in the center of his chest and watched Scott gasp for breath and his eyes flicker around, his body begin to move, before Stiles caged his face in his hands and made Scott look at him.

“You with me buddy?”

He nodded shakily and slowly stood. Stiles offered him a small package of blueberry Twizzlers.

“What?” Scott asked with wide eyes.. because they didn’t make blueberry Twizzlers.

“Don’t tell anyone,” Stiles told him with a smile and stood back up. “Well Alpha Hale?”

Derek swallowed, “Is Erica okay?”

He nodded, “Barely. She put up a hell of a fight against one apparently. That’s where they found her.  No doubt that’s what hit Boyd and Melissa—“

“My mom?” Scott asked looking at him.

“Chill,” Stiles said. “She ran one over with her car. Mild bump to the head, she’s at the hospital with Boyd who had the worst of it.”

“How many are still alive potentially?”

Stiles looked towards the sky then to the group around them, “Enough that I’ll be busy tonight, but for now, let’s get everyone somewhere a little safer.”

“The North Safe House should be alright, right?” Kira asked.

Derek nodded and Stiles gave him his keys, “Take the injured straight there, I’ll call for backup.”

Derek nodded and Stiles clapped him on the shoulder, “Breathe, Alpha. Everything’s going to be just fine. Keep Scott warm and get them home, kay?”

He nodded shakily and watched the jeep truck a little closer and open its doors. There was the sound of awe and reverence as figures moved closer to load their injured inside. Derek took Erica on his back and carried her back towards Beacon Hills city. Luckily, Derek has the keys to all the safe house on his personal key ring and opens the door. He turns on the lights and tells them all to come in, to relax, eat and rest.

“Thank you, Alpha Hale,” the leader he supposed said with a nod of her head. “Not many leaders of territories are so kind anymore.”

Derek gives her a weak smile before guiding the members of his Pack out the door, into the jeep and drives to the hospital to get Erica checked. They say she’s tired, a bit banged up, but she’ll be fine, but they’ll keep her overnight for observation just in case. Boyd is still in surgery and Melissa is up commanding nurses to get moving so he stays at her bedside until she wakes up. Kira and Scott are sitting in the room Boyd will be moved to waiting to give the signal that he’s out.

“What… Derek?”

“Hey,” he said slowly. “How are you feeling?”

“Like I got the crap beat out of me… What the hell happened?”

“Seems like you got attacked… People seeking asylum saved you.”

“Remind me to thank them… Why do you look like that?”

Derek shook his head and she snorted, “It takes a lot more than whatever goes bump in the night to get rid of me Alpha-kins.”

He laughed and kissed her forehead, when the doctor cleared her to walk, he took her to Boyd’s room where he was sporting a cast, but awake. Erica crawled into bed with him and curled up at his side promising to kill whatever attacked him.

“From the sound of it, sounds like someone else is already taking care of that…”

*

Stiles said he’d call for backup. What he meant was that he’d let the dragon community know that there was another band of refugees that may need medical help at the North safe house. He purged the spots where the band had killed the two hellhounds that had followed them through the territory and walked towards the hole. He left a trail of his magic presence along the path he walked and headed straight towards the breech. It looked as though it’d been cause by the hounds running into it while they chased the group of were-dragons.

“Help…”

He turned his head to see the man lying in the dirt, looking as if he was barely hanging on to his life, torn up, large chunks  missing out of him and dark scales half ripped from his body: a black dragon. Stiles kneeled and eased him into sleep before casting wave upon wave of healing magic over him. It was odd that they would attack a gate-keeper. It meant that these were just escape artists from the otherworld, but had been summoned and set loose on purpose.

The snarl on his left tells him that it’s time to move he throws the body lunging at him in a gust of power through the barrier, then the next and the one after until finally he just suspended them in the air above his head as until the last of the wounds closed and the man began to breathe a little easier.

Stiles stood then and looked them over. They were feral, definitely, but they were tagged with a summoning circle. The other two spots had been as well. It wasn’t a long distance spell, so these had to have been dispatched from somewhere in California.

Damn--it was a test. To send them back, would be suspicious, to kill them would be suspicious… His only choice was to exorcise them. He really hated doing that. It was always messy, but he stepped outside the barrier, cast a thick net of magic over the hole and went out to the nearest hell spot he could find. It was small but it would do as it was far enough from the barrier wall to seem as though some random warrior had deported them rather than an agent of  Beacon Hills.

Stiles closed his eyes and drew them to hover over the spot along with the orbs of the two that had been killed in the forest. He feels the seam of the gate and begins to pry at it, slowly and surely it opens to the sound of twisted souls and demons screaming for freedom.

You will never be rid of me Stiles! he hears from the depths.

He casts them down with a healthy dose of pure magic and seals the hole completely. The earth rumbled and melted into a pit of black goo, hiccupping a thick blob over Stiles staining his clothes black and covering his head in the sticky mess.

Ugh…

The were-dragon he’d healed was still unconscious when he returned and levitated the man into the air with him before flying back towards Beacon Hills city and trying to get rid of the black goo. Dark ectoplasm was always the worst… and it always stained!

“Derek is so paying for another shirt…”

Stiles snorted, maybe he’d expense it. What a whimsical thing… A five dollar expense report. Stiles drops that were-dragon off at the hospital and goes to the Barracks to collect the jeep. When he arrives, there’s the sound of a very stern and angry set of voices and then there’s the screaming.

“What the hell were you thinking?!”

Stiles opens the door to see Aurora glaring at Lydia who looked about ready to slap the hell out of her.

“They didn’t tell me things like this were going to happen!”

“What the hell did you think being an emissary was?” Lydia asked. “A fucking luncheon with other territory heads once in awhile?”

“Well whose fault is that they got through anyway? Why am I being yelled at, shouldn’t we be yelling at the patrols too?”

“Those men nearly lost their lives defending the territory,” Lydia growled. “You have no right to say something like that when you can’t even heal a simple papercut!”

“Like you can, harbinger of death.”

Lydia advances and surprisingly it’s Kira who stops her before landing a hard slap across Aurora’s face.

“Grow the fuck up! You could have gotten us fucking killed tonight because you can’t pull your fucking weight! Derek should have left your sorry ass to die out there, but no! He made sure you were taken care of when all you’ve done is cause us fucking trouble! You come here, you lie to our faces and you don’t even have the decency to say you’re sorry. You think this is how you gain people trust? How you become an emissary? I don’t even trust you enough to leave my bedroom door unlocked!”

Aurora glared at her, “The Council sent me here.”

“To die if you don’t fucking open your eyes and get real!”

“At least I didn’t cry like a little bitch, like your fucking pixie!”

Kira unsheathed her sword and Aurora stepped back.

“Enough,” Derek growled coming around the corner to see them. “You’ll wake, Scott.”

Kira’s eyes flickered, lightning wrapping around the edge of her blade before she sheathed it with a sharp slide into its scabbard. Stiles nods.

“I’m just uh… gonna –“

“Sit Stiles,” he said wearily. “I’m making dinner and everyone will take the next thirty to calm the fuck down.”

Lydia and Kira sit down as Aurora does her best to look angry. Stiles nods and the tense atmosphere and walks to take a seat in one of the armchairs. It’s then when the three of them look at him, splattered in black ooze.

“What the hell is that?” Kira asked.

“Is that dark ectoplasm?” Lydia asked wrinkling her nose.

He held up a hand, “Don’t ask. Just know that the hell hounds have been dealt with.”

Kira and Lydia traded glances as Aurora glared at him, “And where were you?”

“Doing my job,” he said loftily.

She huffed as Stiles let out a breath, “Good thing is that the hole the hounds created is far enough from any city or settlement in the territory that even if my provision don’t hold, there will be plenty of time to defend.”

Aurora watched him, seething, watching them talk to him. The obvious trust that he had with them, the confidence… It made her sick. She was the emissary. Sure, she wasn’t fully trained, but she was in school for it. She’d been bumped up to a third year, didn’t that count for something?

He couldn’t even take the emissarial test, why was he being treated like one of the family and all she got was yelled at? No one told her that things like this would happen. Her uncle just showed her a picture of Derek and told her that he needed an emissary. The territory was well protected by a barrier . Her job was essentially to observe the territory, answer the Council’s questions when asked and keep tabs on the members of the Pack. When Stiles arrived, they added him to the list of people she had to watch, but that was all changed when she’d arrived and had been asked to be a part of a lot of the correspondence. It hadn’t taken long for members of the Pack to dismiss her and eventually regard her with suspicion. She thought uniting with Lydia against Stiles would have given her some in to the pack dynamics, the circle of trust they had—but even that had back fired.

Derek had all but stopped asking her to come to Pack training before she went to school and after that had begun to regulate her to being Charlie’s, his page, assistant. It had almost burned her, but she realized that it was far closer to her understanding of an emissary than going out and being thrown around on a field for hours at a time, or running around the city.

But watching Stiles talk with Lydia and Kira made her stomach tremble.

They trusted him.

Even though she was their emissary by right and title, they trusted him.

Derek announced that dinner was done  a little while later.  Stiles went to go wake Scott up  and get him to the table. Aurora said nothing, watching the exchanges between them all. Allison and Isaac too… they all trusted Stiles.

There was nothing really outstanding about him, she thought. He was pale, lithe of frame, he looked more feminine than masculine if he turned certain ways and he wasn’t an emissary. He was a consultant a freelance consultant who had no more loyalty to Beacon Hills than someone in Canada.

Yet they trusted him.

Sure he grew up in Beacon Hills, went to school with most of them, but that wasn’t it.

“So what’s the next step?” Isaac asked. “Do you have any idea who could tag hell hounds?”

Stiles snorted, “I’ve got a few ideas, yeah. But more than that, we should figure out why they were forced to come here. A band of ten were-dragons together make sense, but there were at least forty that came in, that we know of… they don’t usually travel in such large numbers like that. Not in their human forms anyway.”

Were-dragons usually live under a Clan. If they migrate, they usually fly to do so. It’s faster. Not to mention was just plain easier to do. But such a large group of them came by foot and portal no doubt which means they didn’t want the visibility … meant they were running from something or someone who  could tag hell hounds and that wasn’t good. He’d have to speak with Qara as soon as possible, but for now it was best to let them rest, mourn their losses, and be together…

Not to mention he needed a shower desperately.

*

Derek is due for a meeting with researchers who have been brought in to study the barrier so Stiles is left to find his way to the North Safe House alone. He stops off at the hospital to pick up Melissa for directions. The Safe House is far larger than he imagined, the size of the Hale House with more floors. It’s a work of art that radiates home and safety. Probably the perfect place for refugees.

“It’s a nice place… couldn’t have been cheap.”

“He does have a lot of insurance policies cashed out in his name…”

Stiles swallowed the bitter taste of those words as he pulled up to the front of the house and climbed out.

“Derek will come up to visit later, but for now it’s just us,” Stiles said with a grin as he knocked on the door.

It opened  and Qara took him in with a smile, “Hello Stiles.”

He nods, “Hello Qara.”

Odd, Qara had never greeted him that way before, but she let them in and Stiles took note of the silence in the house as if everyone was cloaked under a silencing spell. He frowned.

“What’s going on?”

Qara’s eyes flickered to Melissa and back to him before giving him a meaningful look.

Stiles shook his head, duh, “She’s a nurse and mother to a member in the pack. This is Melissa McCall.”

Qara let out a relieved sigh and all at once the glamour peeled back and the sound and smell of pain and antiseptic came into the air. Stiles swallowed, it was worse than he thought. Melissa pulled off her jacket, rolled up her sleeves and headed to kitchen to wash her hands.

“If you’ll let her, she’ll do all she can,” Stiles said.

Qara nodded but took his hand, leading him towards the stairs and up.

“I assume this is the point where you tell me what’s going on?” Stiles said. “How was the delivery by the way?”

She squeezed his hand meaningfully and swallowed, “It went well.”

He frowned at her tone before she opened the door and he heard the weak sound of a child coughing and the low murmuring of a male voice.

Takot looked up with a relieved smile, “Stiles… thank the winds.”

He smiled and came closer, kneeling by the bed to peer into the tiny bundle Takot had been speaking to—well if that wasn’t surprising.

Bright golden eyes peered at him through the swaddle of blankets, a fevered flush across her cheeks—she was sick with something, but the golden scales along her neck and temples told him volumes.

Qara had given birth to a gold dragon.

Oh shit, he thought and looked to Qara and Takot with a nod, “What genes…”

She snorted and whacked him in the shoulder, “I take it that those that came with were a part of the resistance?”

Qara nodded, “We’ve lost many on the way, but they… they were glad to lose their lives if it meant keeping her safe.”

“Yet…. For all the sacrifice… they still—“

Stiles lay a hand on Takot’s shoulder, “Chill out papa-draco, she’ll be just fine. Does she have anything that she’s absolutely fascinated by?”

Qara smiled and moved across the room as Stiles began to unwrap the baby girl. Wearing a diaper and tweetie onesie, she was easily the cutest baby he’d ever had the pleasure of seeing. But she was burning up, and while she wasn’t wailing in pain, he knew it was only a matter of time judging by how fussy she was becoming. Qara came back with a small tweetie umbrella. It was short and lavender in color but the handle was a fully plastic mock up of Tweetie in one of his classically “innocent” poses.

Her eyes watched the handle with wonder and babbling, her arms reaching for it as he waved it back and forth. He made the character move to make her giggle. He hummed getting a good view of her energy. She’d inhaled something, just the tail end of a curse, which meant that, more than likely, one of her parents had gotten the brunt of it. Expanding his senses, he could tell that it was in fact Qara and shook his head.

Of course it was Qara.

“Got any napkins?” He asked. Qara handed him a handful before he began poking her with the end of the umbrella. She giggled with glee and her nose began to run with a dark blue liquid. He dabbed it away until her nose stopped running and grinned down at her.

“You are the cutest thing to ever cute.”

She giggled and reached for him. He set the umbrella down to lift her from the bed.

“Baby’s all better now, aren’t you?”

She squealed her eyes lighting up and wiggling in his hold. Qara finally sat down with a deep breath. Stiles whirled and poked her with the umbrella and she let out a startled yelp before her nose began to run. He gave her tissues and shifted the baby in his arms as she continued to blow her nose.

“What?”

“Tweetie is magical.”

The baby cheered with a toothless grin and accepted the umbrella from Stiles, “You take care of that alright? It’s magic.”

She gurgled and happily let herself be handed to Qara who looked exhausted. Takot  managed to get her to lay down, sleep-drunk and a little high on the extra bit of magic he’d added.

“You… drugged me,” she slurred accusingly as Takot tucked her in.

“For your own good,” Stiles told her.

A knock sounded on the door to announce that Derek had arrived and the Stiles was needed downstairs. The woman looked at Qara and the half asleep baby curled up against her before looking at Stiles.

“They’ll both be just fine. Just a little tired.”

She nodded shakily and led him down the stairs as Stiles instructed Takot to get some rest with a light tap to the shoulder.

“You’re drugging me…” he slurred.

They really were made for each other, he thought seeing them curl around their baby girl and hold each other’s hands in their sleep. He charmed a blanket to cover them and closed the door behind him. Melissa was already blood-splattered when he came down the steps and Derek was leeching pain from the man she was examining.

“It’s no good,” she said. “There’s too much damage…”

Derek winced at that and looked up to see Stiles coming down the stairs and moving to them. The man on the table huffed, eyes bright. He was an older man, seasoned from war and turmoil—a red dragon from the tinting at his temples.

“Just do it,” he grunted. “Just… do it.”

Melissa winced, she wasn’t a surgeon, “We’ll have to get you to a hospital.”

“No!” he thundered. “No-No hospitals. They’ll find me. Just cut it off, I’ll be fine.”

Stiles kneeled and grabbed the man’s foot who stared at him.

“Relax,” Stiles breathed and he waited until the terror blossomed in the man’s eyes before pushing a storm of magic through his leg.

The man cried out, shaken and utterly shocked as the wounds snapped closed and the bones snapped into place. Derek’s eyes widened looking at Stiles as he pat the guy’s leg. There was something, a shimmer in the air that meant magic but no scent to it as if it was just raw energy pulled from the universe and channeled into the man’s leg.

“I think we’ve all lost enough, no need to add your leg to it.”

He stared at Stiles in wonder as did Melissa and Derek. Stiles only grinned and looked at them. The grin evaporated.

“What?”

“You have… some serious explaining to do,” Derek said with a sigh, “But that can wait.”

Melissa whacked him in the shoulder, “Serious explaining, mister.”

Stiles scrunched up his nose and began to make rounds, greeting people he recognized, meeting others he didn’t checking in with people before Derek banished himself to the kitchen to make a ridiculous amount of food. Melissa helped and within the hour there was a battalion size feast sitting on the long dining table, piping hot and Stiles had healed everyone else who’d needed it.

“Was that also low level healing magic?”

Stiles flushed and didn’t bother to look at him as people clamoured around the table and began to eat. Qara, Takot and the baby arrived a while later, with the baby girl sleeping soundly in her father’s arms. There was a low cheer around the table for them when Stiles nodded to Derek to join him outside.

Derek takes a seat on the porch bench and watches Stiles pace. It was such an odd thing, pacing. No one had ever paced in his family.

“Qara is an alpha dragon of the black variety. Takot is a beta dragon of the white variety and together they’ve had a golden dragon baby girl. Who is the cutest child to ever cute.”

Derek’s eyebrows go up, a little confused, he was pretty sure that Stiles had to be mistaken. Black and white made grey after all.

“What?”

“Golden dragons appear on the eve of a great disruption to the world, they aren’t a matter of genetics, but the will of the universe.”

Derek blinked, “That’s… bad isn’t it?”

“Not totally, but it isn’t good either. You have no idea how many songs there are about a golden dragon showing up in the world. What people don’t understand is that they are omens not causes. They signal the beginning of a new ear and obviously certain members of the were-dragon, hell the supernatural , community like the era we’re in right now.”

Derek nodded as Stiles stopped, “They came here for Asylum.”

Derek nodded. Sanctuary was a deal between territories really… Asylum was willfully harboring another territory’s fugitive and being prepared to defend that at all costs. From the way Stiles was speaking, it sounded like they really had no choice.

“And they came here?”

“When hope is lost,” Stiles said softly. “And the way is dark. May we be the beacon in the night.”

Derek frowned, the words feeling familiar to him for some reason and looked at Stiles.

“The barrier is crumbling, yet we are still a beacon to those who have no light,” he said with a nod.

The way Mom would have wanted it…Stiles takes a deep breath before looking at Derek, “Well, Alpha. What’s your verdict?”

Derek snorted, “When you lose your way, follow the beacon in the hills.”

Stiles laughed and nodded, “I’ll get the paperwork ready. I’ve notified the local Clan leader as well.”

Derek nodded and followed Stiles back in and positioned Derek at the head of the table.

“Jil tova tak il nal jil’Clin. DiÞ tak yola uir Roli iln jil,”7 Stiles said formerly with a grin.

There was relief that flickered and grew, admiration and wonder as Stiles went on to explain that Derek was the alpha of Beacon Hills, for them to rest and when they were ready they were welcome to migrate to behind the dragon gates or remain here.

Derek wasn’t sure why he felt so … good, but he did. There was a warm, light feeling blossoming in his chest at the way they looked at him.

Hope, he thought. There was hope and peace in their eyes.

*

Erica and Boyd get out of the hospital and head straight to the Barracks where Derek is making breakfast and everyone else is climbing out bed, with the exception of Stiles who has caught a redeye transport to another territory. The band of were-dragons migrate slowly behind the dragon gates within a few days.

And in those days, Aurora has attempted to display her “newly learned” prowess. Derek can’t figure out what she thinks she’s doing other than providing mild entertainment or annoyance. She’d basically failed the test in the woods and now there was no doubt that she hadn’t grown up even a little.  When Stiles returns, its after Derek has given her a stack of books to read through on the founding of Beacon Hills. Stiles strides into the office, drops off a fancy basket of treats onto Charlie’s desk and tells her that the chocolates are the best in the world before heading towards his office.

Derek grabs him and drags him into his own office and closes the door before turning to Stiles who waits expectantly.

“Is there a reason why you dragged me in here? Something wrong?”

Derek placed his hands on his shoulders, “It’s break for the local emissary school…”

“Yeah…” Stiles said with a nod. “And?”

“Aurora thinks that, in her short time in being in school, she has learned what it means to be an emissary.”

Stiles nodded, “I’m waiting for it.”

“She’s driving me crazy,” he burst out turning and breaking out into angry circles while seething and complaining about the insane things she’s been doing. Like interjecting in meetings that the other Pack members are holding, forcibly putting herself into conversations that she can’t understand and then demanding that everyone speak English.

Stiles only smiled watching Derek walk around in circles, the sort of frustrated prowling that made his voice get rougher and his eyes start to glow red.

The poor baby was really stressed out. Stiles swallowed and pulled out a pad of paper to begin taking notes. A large majority of it centered around Aurora making everyone’s life difficult. Stiles took it as a clue to design a training program for her that involved a lot of reading, writing, history, and the library.

“On top of all this, there have been no less than three more holes in the barrier, and probably another fifty refugees from other territories.”

“From where?”

He shook his head, “Everywhere. Texas, North Carolina… hell there’s a Korean Gasin in the Southern Safe House right now alone, terrified and barely of age! And I don’t speak Korean! Or gasin or snake!”

Stiles looked up at that as Derek continued to prowl around the room, glaring menacingly at the small stack of paperwork at the corner of his desk. Stiles moved to lean against the desk and took the stack off the desk, transferring them to the crook of his arm until Derek kept marching, his eyes focused on nothnig.

“She’s in snake form?”

“Yes and she won’t come out of it ever since she arrived in Beacon Hills according to the guys that found her.”

Stiles nodded, placing a star next to the Gasin in the Southern Safe House. Probably an eopsin and as Derek went on Stiles realized that the source of Derek’s stress was really far simpler than it seemed. He’d let everything build up while Stiles was gone and had tried to take care of it himself even if he hadn’t known how to. Derek still wasn’t used to having back up and perhaps Stiles just hadn’t made it clear enough.

“You know… you could email, text, call even when things like this come up,” he said with a touch of humor in his voice. “That way, you won’t get so worked up.”

“I can’t call you all the time! You’ll never get any sleep if I do that.”

Stiles laughed but didn’t say anything about the fact that Stiles rarely slept. With the amount of magic always flooding his system, he had very little need to sleep. Furthermore, what was the point of having Stiles on retainer if he wasn’t going to call when he needed help?

“Well… you could not but… I can’t guarantee you’ll be better off for it… judging by the state you’re in right now…”

“What state?”

Stiles gave him a flat look and Derek almost groaned. It wasn’t that he was really worked up, but having to keep an extra eye on Aurora was grating on his nerves. He couldn’t wait until she went back to school. And then he paled: summer break. That would be at least… two and a half months of her…. in territory… getting on his nerves.

His wolf growled and he felt his claws sliding out.

“What about Lenara? Wiccans and Druids don’t always see eye to eye… not to mention she hates me.”

Derek shook his head.

“You made dinner in your underwear for her and she gave up?” Stiles let out a low whistle. “That isn’t good.”

Derek refused to blush at the fact that apparently Lenara and Dasha were telling people about how desperate he’d been to get Lenara to at least try.

“Don’t worry, they’ve gotten me mostly naked too. I think it’s a bit of entertainment and a chance to leer.”

Derek figured it would be more a chance to feed for Lenara, but didn’t say as much as Stiles opened his phone. He’d taken down at least a few pages of notes from Derek’s rant and somehow… Derek felt a little better knowing that Stiles was not only there, but informed and taking matters into his own hands.

“I’ll see what I can do about getting Aurora out of your hair and the rest of it. In the meantime, State of the Territory Address and Tours.”

“Tours?” Derek asked.

“Alpha tradition,” he said. “Your Mom and Laura would go to schools, have a whole “Meet the Alpha Day” for kids.”

Derek nodded, his throat tightening. He’d forgotten that  and stowed it away with the pressing need to enter his mother’s study. His wolf growled at that. The clock was ticking and he needed to venture in there before it was too late. With the group of researchers here they’d need all the background they could get.

He only wish he knew where Claudia’s office was...He knew logically she had one in city hall, but her personal office would have been the one that had all the things he needed. Talia’s office would hold information, but as it was Claudia who’d raised the barrier…

He needed to find her kid… daughter, son, whatever.

“Also, I think you need a more visual calendar.”

He frowned as Stiles stood up and pulled the paper calendar down from the wall.

“What’s that going to do for me?” Derek asked.

“Well it’ll warn you when Aurora is due back, where I am, if I’m awake, and any important dates, etc.”

Derek sighed listening to Stiles doing something on the wall with a deep sigh. State of the Territory Address was going to be hard enough. It may mean speaking blankly into a camera for thirty minutes or so, but jeez a tour?

“All done.”

When he turned around to see it on his wall, he wondered how many secrets Stiles had behind the snark. It was perfect with everyone in the pack having a separate color and icons to track where they were, what their schedules were like, including himself and Stiles. He almost laughed at the icons as they were just short of silly. A black wolf cub for him that looked a lot like himself when he was a kid, sat at the lower corner looking over the the icons of his Pack member with glowing red eyes. Scott’s was a daisy, Kira’s was a lightning bolt, Lydia’s was a blood red pump, Jackson’s was a slice of pound cake a la mode, Erica’s was a basket of fried chicken, and Boyd’s was a lobster. Stiles’ was a pentagram imposed over a spiderweb.

“You can change the icons obviously. I just thought it would be easier for you and your wolf to know where everyone was.”

He nodded, “It’s… perfect. thank you.”

Stiles grinned and pointed to the two clocks, one with Beacon Hills’s  symbol on the clock face and the other with Stiles’s icon on the clock face.

“This will tell you what time it is where I am and if I’m awake. You.of course have access to this calendar on your phone. Charlie has access to it as well.”

Derek nodded and took a deep breath, “I need you to write that speech mister. I’ll take care of these and we’ll regroup in after lunch, kay?”

Derek nodded, taking a seat in his chair, “Thanks… Stiles.”

“Have some snacks and relax, you aren’t alone in this.”

Derek frowned and opened the top drawer to see the drawer full of snacks, but not the ones that Charlie would buy for him… They were snacks from his childhood. Pork and steak strip jerky, the pork was smoked apple and chipotle. Orange and apple juice boxes and apple sauce tubes, dried fruit chips of a myriad of flavors, chocolate milk, edamame… His eyes burned reaching into the drawer with a shaky hand and his eyes drifted lower to the mini refrigerator, sleek, discreet and tiny person accessible, filled with more of those nostalgic foods.

“Derek? Are you alright?” Charlie asked coming and seeing him staring, red eyed and tears streaming at the pork jerky bag he’d opened.

“Y-Yeah,” he said with a nod. “I’m fine.”

At first bite, it’s like she’s there with him, stroking his head as he sat beside her desk, coloring on whatever rejected piece of legislation from the council she’d given him and speaking to Claudia about the growing stack for him to color on. It’s a bittersweet taste, but he laughs because he should think about hiring toddlers to reject to papers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) Easy or Relax. (A request)  
> 2) They are not enemies  
> 3) This is Alpha Hale and the Beacon Hills Pack.  
> 4) Why have you come here?  
> 5) Easy, you are safe.  
> 6) Hell Dog  
> 7) We welcome you to our territory. May you find peace and acceptance here with us.


	12. Tis The Season

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fun.
> 
> Happy Christmas and New Year's....

Derek is annoyed. Then again, Derek has been more annoyed than usual since Aurora had taken it upon herself to _help_ him get through his paperwork. He isn’t sure how he’s managed not to claw her face off yet considering that she, more than once, has mixed up the stacks Charlie has perfected for him.

“I just thought I could help if everything was a little more organized….” she would say and Derek, somehow, wouldn’t rage out on her. …

But today… Today was something that he couldn’t look past. He opened the door and all at once chemicals, fake lemon and forest scents assaulted him, dragging sharp fingers through his senses and blotting out whatever he was thinking about. His heart sunk and stuttered-- he couldn’t smell his past, his mother, Claudia. He couldn’t smell anything besides the roar of chemicals there.

He felt it first as a tingle in his throat, the pricking in his eyes and this… this was just too much right now. Someone had cleaned his office. After three years of fending off the cleaning staff, someone had cleaned his office.

If that wasn’t so bad, his stacks… the three that were usually a manageable height were there. Charlie wasn’t in yet, he’d planned on coming early to get through the batch of paperwork he hadn’t gotten to the day before. There were calls to make and other such issues, but today should have been simple…

But no, the three stacks he’d had, scented specifically were no longer three stacks, but seven all stacked high above the top of his computer screens, taking all the space on his desk that wasn’t reserved for his keyboard. If he sat, he had no doubt that the stacks would be taller than him and he felt his jaw twitch.

_Breathe_ , he reminded himself. Perhaps it wouldn’t be as bad… But his eyes found the card sitting on his keyboard. It was one of those hallmark note cards and he didn’t need to go in to know that it was from Aurora saying something about organizing and _cleaning_ his office.

He twitched again and closed the door, the smell of cleaning supplies and the like still seeped from beneath the door crack but it wasn’t as bad as it had been.

“Hey, big guy.”

He didn’t move as Stiles came up behind him. His hand shaking on the doorknob and his breath coming in and out in shuddering breaths.

Stiles watched the tick in his shoulder and felt the roiling rage coming from him. It wasn’t all alpha power, but alpha, lycan, _black wolf_ power and maybe also years of repressing the bone-crushing depression of losing everyone he’d ever held dear in such quick succession. Whatever had happened, threatened to tip the already precarious scale Derek lived.

“You alright big guy?” Stiles asked, keeping himself calm and stepping into Derek’s periphery. The man opened the door and Stiles’s nose wrinkled at the flood of laboratory lemons, bleach and wood polish.

Stiles nodded and placed a hand on the curve of his bicep, before drawing the door closed. Seeing his face, Derek looks somewhere in between rage and sobbing. He doesn’t look his age, but looks like his life at the moment: somewhere up in the air. His eyes are glowing red and they’re glossy as if he’s about to start crying or maybe claw something.

“Come on,” he said gently, tugging gently, getting Derek to stalk beside him, down the hall to the office Stiles had taken over.

It had been Claudia’s and while the set up was almost identical, it wasn’t completely the same. The scent of magic was stronger, but the smell of Claudia, Laura, and Talia was still there. Stiles directed him to the chair behind the desk, turned on the computer and watched the wall light up with the calendar.

He opened the window and set an orb of magic in the opening so when the wind blew it would fill the room with Hale scents from Derek’s memory. He opens his desk drawer and pulls out a bag of pork jerky, a tin of gooey, warm chocolate chip cookies, and an apple juice box before carding a hand through Derek’s hair.

The man lets out a sound, but continues staring at the keyboard, his breathing growing deeper, more steady with every moment.

“It’s okay,” he said softly, stroking his hair with steady passes of his hand and soft words. “It’s okay.”

A wind blew and Stiles offers thanks to his mother’s spirit for the fresh gust of happy memories that are just nostalgic enough to make him relax, but not enough to make him sob.

As Derek relaxes, Stiles drips calming spells into the seams of his clothing. He edges them slowly and watches his body relax and then his wolf begin to simmer down. After adding a few more, he slides a more powerful version into the chair and tells Derek to use this office today and he’ll get him his paperwork in proper order. When Stiles leaves, it takes another minute for the maelstrom in Derek’s body to die down enough for him to realize that there are snacks set out for him, not because he’s hungry but because they’re comforting. There’s a sticky note on the top drawer that tells him that there’s more there and a refrigerator in the bottom left drawer.

He remembers then that Claudia was left handed where his mother was right handed and this was Claudia’s office. It would stand to reason why it smelled so much like her and Talia and Laura and…

_Home._ His wolf whimpers as he stabs the straw into the juice box in front of him and begins to drink thoughtfully. When his claws retract and he’s sure the red glow is gone, he turns on the computer and gets to work.

*

Stiles hears the clicking of keys a few minutes after he leaves the room and lets out a deep breath before hurrying down the hallway to catch Charlie before she sits down, unfortunately, she’s coming out of Derek’s office looking pale.

“Stiles, what—”

“He’s in the other office,” Stiles told her, “Any ideas?”

“Who else?”

_Aurora,_ he groaned. Derek said he’d found something for her to do, but apparently that wasn’t working out. Looks like Stiles was going to have to get creative, he walked into Derek’s office with her and shut the door. She opened the window and felt the swirl of air run through the room and carry out as much of the chemical scent as possible.

“What was she thinking?” Charlie asked. “Why are the stacks so high? Why are there so many?”

“Probably because she found your stash of backlog and set them on his desk.”

She groaned. She’d been baby feeding Derek bits of the backlog mixed in with the current stuff since he became Alpha or the territory after the first day of him just pushing all the papers on the floor in a fit of rage. She was lucky he hadn’t ripped them out with the state he’d been in at the time. It had take some time with Lenara and Dasha to come up with a system that would work for her and Derek.

With the amount of power rocking around inside him, too much for him to control in the wake of everything, his wolf wouldn’t stand for a challenge, his senses would stand for the chemical scent of paperwork blotting out the scent of Talia, Laura and Claudia that had seeped into the office itself. Three stacks maximum: mundane, semi-serious, and serious and no taller than a water bottle. The stacks were scented as well so that the bottom of the stack had the strongest scent: the forest for the serious, a field for semi-serious, and the ocean breeze for mundane. She didn’t know what the significance of that was, but she’d followed it faithfully since it seemed to be working.

When he was done with the stacks, she’d restack them with current work and backlog and they’d been working that way for a while. The back log had gone from the full basement, floor to ceiling, to three fourths of a room before Stiles came. Since Stiles arrived, it had gone down exponentially to just a fourth of the room. She had no doubt that Aurora had only stopped at nine stacks of paper so tall because there was nowhere else to place them.

“Stupid girl,” she groaned. “And they’re all mixed up!”

Stiles only shook his head, there was no way they were going to be able to get it all fixed in a timely manner if he didn’t use a bit of magic, so he waved his hand across the room and watched the pages stand and dance. A cart appeared and the pages began to march themselves into the correct order on the cart. The top shelf would go directly to Derek, the middle would be the switch outs and the bottoms were going back into Stiles’s office.

Where Derek had far too much to handle the daunting appearance of a stack of papers, and who actually used his desk for other things, Stiles had no problem housing stacks of papers throughout the day and getting them all done before he left. When the scent of fake cleaners vanished from the room and it smelled a lot more like it was supposed to, Stiles set an orb of magic, behind a portrait by the window and left the window open.

“There we are,” Stiles said with a nod and giving Charlie a high-five.

“Now what do we do about Aurora?” Charlie asked.

Stiles leaned his hip against the desk and crossed his arms. She wasn’t going to listen to him unless he literally had her by the throat and that wouldn’t happen until summer break when the third years would do their homestays. He’d have to be more creative to get her out of his, and more importantly Derek’s hair, before she got herself killed.

Stiles had the patience of a saint most days, but even this would drive him up a wall. He glanced at the calendar. He had a bunch of out of territory assignments coming up and so he wouldn’t be able to physically keep an eye on her...

“You’re going to have to lie to her,” Charlie decided.

“How so?”

She grinned, “She hates you.”

Stiles nodded, that was true even though he couldn’t really understand why. Charlie laughed at his confused and understanding expression.

“You took her spot, Stiles,” she explained. “She’s supposed to be the Pack’s emissary, but no one trusts her.”

It didn’t help that she lied about her abilities, continued to make trouble for the pack, and was essentially a spy for the Council. He wasn’t sure if she was playing stupid, or if she was generally just unaware, but either way Aurora was a piece of trouble that needed to be dealt with.

“She wants Derek’s trust,” she said. “She came here, obviously, because she wanted him, not necessarily to be an emissary. So we make up a list of things for her to do, make her think it’s a list made by Derek and viola… out of your hair.”

He nodded thoughtfully; she was positively devious, “What going to make her do it?”

She grinned, “Make her think it’s a list that Derek has given you as an emissarial consultant.”

“You’re… positively Machiavellian.”

She beamed at him. It was a brilliant plan and may actually get some things done that needed to be done, but no one had time to do.

He nodded, yes. This would work out wonderfully.

“Gossip 1?”

Charlie nodded, “Gossip 1.”

*

When Aurora arrived at city hall, Stiles was standing in front of Charlie’s desk with a list in his hand.

“Right, so I’m off to a human territory in Canada next week and the week after I’ll be in Egypt, but I should be around for Christmas and New Year’s. They want some help with a curse and a sphinx…so I don’t think I’ll be able to get through this list before I leave.”

Charlie sighed and shook her head, “He’s not going to be happy about this. Derek needs most of that done while he’s gone.”

Aurora stepped forward, “Most of what done?”

Stiles glanced over at her and then turned, “He’s gone for the West Coast Conference, he’ll be back the day I leave.  He gave me this list—”

She took it from him and Stiles let her have it and without looking at it told him that she’d take care of it as she was the Beacon Hills _Emissary_.

“You sure about that? He’s got the anchor for the list so he could add more to it.”

“I’m sure. I am an _emissary_ after all. What the alpha wants, he gets. Something a consultant wouldn’t understand.”

With that she leaves with such a flourish, Stiles isn’t sure how he’s not laughing, but when she’s officially gone, they both crumble and laugh.

“ _I am an emissary after all,_ ” Stiles repeats stiffly. “I can’t believe that worked…”

Charlie snorted, “Of course it worked. It was one of my plans.”

“I’ll be sure to bring you back presents. In any case, I’ll be sure to keep her busy.”

“What did you put on that list?”

He grinned, “Useful things.”

In reality, they really were things that needed to be done. They weren’t frivolous. Make arrangements for the State of the Territory Address which included finding a place in Beacon Hills central city, alerting the press, announcing the date and time, and food, seating, security etc. all  had to be taken care of as Lydia was already in charge of dressed Derek. Then there were arrangements for the Christmas events for the Pack and the tours. Christmas Eve and Day and all the days leading up to the New Year would all be a part of Derek’s tour around the territory. Making arrangements for food, a place to cook, and space for the events would be a doozy.

“Wow… that sounds really… emissarial…”

He grinned, “I know.”

“You sure we can trust her with all that?”

Stiles snorted, “No, but thankfully I’ve already done all the prep work and I’ve got my eye on everything. All she’s there for is to manage it while we’re gone.”

“You think it’ll really keep her busy?”

“Oh yeah,” he grinned. “She’ll be so busy that when it’s time for her to go back to school, she’ll damn near miss her transport.”

*

When Derek comes back from the conference, he feels… oddly good. It went far better than he thought it would, maybe thanks to Stiles’s notes and innate ability to anticipate Derek’s questions and the issues that he could run into. He leaves with agreements for help from a few of the neighboring territories, a promise of the southern safe house for sanctuary for a group of refugees from Washington.

They’ll be arriving the day Stiles is set to come back from Egypt.

_What the hell is he doing in Egypt anyway?_

It’s a passing thought, when he arrives at city hall, he’s a little terrified to walk into his office, but he opens it and there’s a distinct feeling that no one has been in the room since he left. There are no stacks on his desk, the calendar is still glowing on the wall and it smells like home.

_What happened while I was away?_

He closes the door and walks straight to Charlie’s desk who sets the phone in its cradle and looks up at him. She looks no different than the first day he’d come to his mother’s office. Barely two years old, stumbling around on legs that weren’t quite used to the ground, holding his father’s hand. She smiled at him, that indulgent smile she always gave him.

“Welcome back, had a good trip?”

He nodded, “I see my office… isn’t…”

“Distressed?”

He nodded.

“I came up with an idea and Stiles… followed through.”

He frowned, “Have you killed her?”

She snorted, “No, give him more credit. He put her to work.”

Derek wanted to know exactly how that was working out but when Lydia strolled in with a suit bag over her shoulder and that smile that meant trouble, he knew there was no time to ask.

“Welcome back, I have clothes for you to try on.”

He should have known.

There’s only one suit in the bag, she explains that the suit for his official Alpha pictures for the website is on the way, but this is for his first official State of the Territory Address. The rest of the clothes are for the tour. All lycan friendly, comfortable and somewhere in between casual and business: suit jackets and jeans.

“California business,” she said with a smile as he shrugs on the first jacket. It’s red, a deep blood red, cut well with no button, it’s meant to make him look just short of business.

“Yum, try the green one.”

It’s a fashion show to make sure everything fits and maybe so she can plan what he’s wearing. When he asks why this was so important, Lydia explains that there will be pictures being taken of him constantly for the website that will be launch New Year’s Day.

“We have to have a good image you know?”

There’s a forest green for Christmas, a blueish grey, a deep gold for New Years and of course a black. They all fit well, skimming the broadness of his shoulders, making his size look capable rather than intimidating. The gold is just short of goofy in its festiveness and somehow he doesn’t grumble about it.

When he’s done with those, he tries on the suit and shoes and earns a wolf whistle for his trouble.

“Offensive,” he grumbled.

“Hotness,” she replied and asked him to do a spin before nodding. “It’s perfect. Can’t wait to see you in the alpha suit.”

He shakes his head and head to take off the suit and hand it over. He gives her a hug, a kiss to the forehead, and a thank you before she leaves and returns to Charlie’s desk to ask about preparations.

“Stiles and Aurora are handling them. No worries.”

“In the good sort of way?”

“In the best sort of way.”

He tried to wrap his mind around that, honestly he does, but he can’t believe it.

Three days pass like that and everyday Aurora all but drags herself into the loft and into bed, looking as if she’s done nothing but run around all day.

“Charlie is a genius,” Erica said with glee before calling the attention of everyone present. Derek is out for a run and due back soon, but she’s already reported the good news.

“What’s going on?” Scott asked falling on to the couch beside Kira and Stiles whose eyes are trained on her, but his attention is trained on the laptop he has balanced in his lap. He’s wearing his glasses today, the thick rimmed pair that Lydia picked out for him. They do nothing for his sight unless he’s reading magic script, they give him something to project his own magic field onto and process. The squareness of the lenses gives him something larger and discreet to use than the surface of his eyes, so he can do his research while sitting in the middle of the barracks with no problem.

“I have successfully gotten the human mob and vampyr coven on the East border to come to an agreement!”

Boyd smiled at her proudly and it’s Lydia brings up the obvious, “Negotiated or …?”

She flashed her fangs with glee, “Alphakins taught me well.”

Which really meant there was a bit of fang and violence involved in the negotiations, but at least there wouldn’t be any more fights between the two groups. Erica would know how annoying stakes in the chest get and how letting them force a feeding on people is not only terrifying, but not good PR. The treaty was simple really: humans could volunteer to be fed on, they’d make arrangements for people to be watched in simple feeds for things like psychic consultations at the same time, vampyrs would help defend the human section as they were the closest to one of the holes in the barrier. With the number of holes appearing in the barrier, everyone needed to pull together if they were going to get through this.

“Where’s Aurora?” Isaac asked lounging with his head in Allison’s lap. Her hand cards through his hair as she’s reading over a document.

“Out working,” Stiles said with a grin. “She’s got deadlines to meet you know?”

“I saw her at the bakery earlier,” Kira said. “What’s she doing?”

“She’s on peacekeeping and territory well-being missions,” he said with a smile. “Picking up the care baskets, wrapping all the boxes that Lydia ordered and then some.”

“Care baskets? Boxes?”

“For the orphanage and helping get it decorated for the holidays. No doubt she’s being run into the ground by the kids.”

Stiles had gone for a visit, alerted them all that she would be there, who she was, and what to do. The staff would be taking a myriad of pictures and the journalist who was there to do an article on Beacon Hills’s orphanage system had been informed to be as indiscreet as possible. Though he’d informed Derek that there would be a journalist team there that wouldn’t be there specifically for him, Derek had growled and nearly backed out of the deal.

“ _Publicity,_ ” Stiles said with Charlie at his side. “ _It’ll be good for the territory.”_

Derek only grumbled that he refused to wear a santa suit. Stiles snorted and offered up a suit bag from Lydia and a santa hat.

“What?”

“He’ll be wearing the hat and festive colors,” Stiles said with a shrug. “The Alpha is a far more interesting tradition than fake Santa and we’ve got plenty of gifts to give them.”

They all glance around one another because the thought of Derek around a bunch of kids is absolutely mind-boggling. More importantly, leaving Derek and Aurora in a room together…

“Alright, are you fucking him?” Allison asked.

Stiles’ jaw dropped, “No. I’m not fucking Derek.”

“You sure, because I’m pretty sure there’s no magic in this world that would get Derek to be so chill.”

Stiles snorted, “I haven’t done anything serious.”

They disagreed, but then Derek was back from his run, shirtless, sweaty and rubbing his head with a towel. Scott vacated his spot allowing Allison to take his place and Lydia to take a seat on the other side of Stiles and Erica at the end.

“What?” Stiles asked recognizing a line up when he saw one.

Not that he blamed them, because Derek was a piece of art. Rippling muscles and broad shoulders, chiseled abs and a five o’clock shadow softer than rabbit fur.

“Yum,” Lydia said watching him walk by. He laughed a bit and stood.

“Are you enjoying the view?”

“You know we are,” Erica said with a low pur.

He shakes his head with a chuckle and turns to head to the shower. Stiles turns his eyes back to his laptop as they lean to watch Derek walk down the hallway.

“I really miss him living here,” Allison said softly.

Lydia let out a sound of approval. Waking up to Derek doing chin ups in the middle of the living room, sitting on his back while he did pushups… Derek out of a shower…

Lydia shuddered, “Really miss it.”

Stiles only laughed and closed his laptop before heading into the kitchen for a glass of water.

“So, what are you doing to alpha-kins that’s making him so calm anyway?”

“Is this a wiccan thing?”

Stiles snorted, “More like an emissary thing. Derek’s a high stress person and he doesn’t let himself have many outlets. It’s best to alleviate the stress _before_ it gets too bad.”

Erica nodded and saw, in Stiles’s hopefully near future, a more physical means of relieving stress with Derek. They waited until Derek walked back down the hallway, his forest green towel wrapped around his waist to talk about anything important…

Because with a view like that, the horror that was their lives at the moment seemed a little more bearable.

“Come join us at the bar, Stiles. Close the laptop: it’s talk time.”

Stiles did as commanded and took a seat as instructed between Lydia and Allison and they watched Derek cook.

“Once, the towel slipped…”

Erica let out a sound, “Looking good, Alpha-kins.”

“I’ve gotten larger towels since then,” Derek said, not bothering to turn around.

“It was before Aurora, when he still lived her,” Allison said with a nod.

“We got one half of a globe… it was beautiful.”

Derek and Stiles snorted as Derek began to put something that smelled really good together and the conversation drifted back towards their current emissary problem. While grateful that she would have something to do for the rest of her break, they weren’t happy about her coming back for the summer.

“Can’t she go home? We have Stiles!”

“She’s the Council assigned emissary,” Derek reminded them over his shoulder. “Less than helpful or not, she is the first step to becoming a first-class territory.”

Erica snorted, “And what the next? Them replacing you?”

“I don’t think the Council is that stupid,” Lydia said. “I think they realize that Derek is probably the only one that people will be happy with in the position.”

Stiles nodded, true. No, the steps to becoming a first-class territory were more tricky than that. It meant letting the council have access to their finances ask them favors, demand tribute, etc. It meant letting them in to Beacon Hills. Stiles was sure that Derek didn’t know that, or if he did he was thinking of a work around.

For what it was worth, being a first-class territory meant that consultants at large, help in general, was more likely to return your calls. It meant getting off the Council’s black list. Unfortunately, for Beacon Hills, there were better, safer, faster ways to do so. Beacon Hills, Claudia and Talia had a lot of enemies… Enemies that were still waiting for the perfect moment to come in and destroy everything.

“Are you sure we can’t get rid of her?” Erica asked. “And does she have to be involved with Christmas and the tours?”

Derek turned and leaned against the counter, “Go on.”

“I mean fine, we have to keep her around for a while, but I don’t think we should let her have any illusion that she’s Pack.”

Derek swallowed and nodded, that was fair.

“I can’t tell if she’s just naive beyond reason or if she thinks she’s cunning enough to get us to trust her. She couldn’t even gain our trust coming in, let alone now that we know exactly how useless she is and how long she’s been lying to us.”

Derek nodded, it was a fair point. Aurora would have to work far more than it seemed she was willing to in order to be pack in the way that mattered.

“Lydia?”

“I’ve already told her that she’s dressing herself and she’d better look nice or she won’t even get a profile picture for the website.”

Derek shook his head, “Lydia.”

“I don’t think I should expend my time dressing someone who would manipulate members of the pack to try and gain a place in it. That isn’t Pack.”

Derek snorted, she sounded like such a lycan… He was rubbing off on them.

“Stiles?” Allison asked. “What are your thoughts on her?”

Stiles hummed with a nod, “Not a good move to lie and continue to fake it… but she was obviously chosen for a reason. She’s a pawn and that isn’t her fault. Not listening however is, putting everyone’s life in danger, is. If she’s going to earn a place in your Pack, she’s going to have to show some humility and some willingness to be Pack.”

“Our,” Allison corrected. Derek gave an assenting huff and opened the stove.

They tilted their heads to see the curve of his ass as he bent over.

“I’m not--”

“A title doesn’t make you pack,” Erica said distantly with a pleased hum. “Trust makes you pack.”

Derek stands back up and slides the cookie sheet on to the stove before calling out that lunch is ready. They’re having burgers and a ridiculous amount of curly fries. He slides into clothing: a forest green henley and jeans, before eating with him.

“Just you wait,” Lydia said menacingly. “I”m going to replace all of them with something that isn’t a henley.”

Derek kissed the top of her head, “Of course you will, Princess.”

She huffed at that, but ate. They chatted about the current state of the barrier, if there was anything extraordinarily pressing on the table, where Stiles would be next week, when he was coming back, and finally it was time for Derek to go be Alpha Santa. The plan was to go to The Lodge today and spend the night and Christmas Day there.

Derek changed into the festive outfit. A forest green blazer with gold trim and a Christmas red handkerchief, a deep gold shirt, and slim cut black jeans. It was comfortable. Erica made it a point to put the santa hat on him, letting some of his hair stick out in the front before letting him get into his car.

“The first wave of gifts are already wrapped and under the tree. The second wave are at city hall being wrapped by a myriad of high school students for community service hours.”

Derek nodded, got in his car and drove to The Lodge. Why Talia and Claudia named it that, he had no idea, but he supposed it was far more uplifting than “Orphanage.” It had been one of the first major buildings of Beacon Hills, placed just outside of the main city. All the kids who’d lost their parents in wars or territory disputes, kids that had been abandoned from other territories were house there, so it was more of a manor than anything.

Usually, there were Christmas festivities held. The kids would get gifts of new clothes, a few toys, and a few other things. Money was accumulated throughout the year for the events, but Derek, after three years as Alpha of Beacon Hills and finally in control of the territory, wanted to change it up a little bit.

For one, they needed a much bigger Christmas tree and decorations and all the things that would have happened had Talia been there... All the festive joy that would have been in the Hale House if his family were still alive. He’d been getting more staff, expanding the compound, and doing his best to not let it fall to the wayside. This year, with Stiles and Charlie’s diligent help, he’d have a chance to spend Christmas Eve and Day with them.

After all, he was an orphan too.

He shook those thoughts away, he was going to meet a bunch of kids who didn’t need the reminder that their families were gone, or that for one reason or another their families didn’t want them around.

He was there to bring what every orphan really wanted: a place to belong. As Alpha of the territory, he thought this was almost more important than keeping everyone alive. What good would it do to be alive and miserable?

The fact that there was a journalism team there to do a spot on The Lodge was an entirely new thing. As he turned out of the city and headed there, he turned on the recording Stiles left for him--his debriefing about the purpose of the article.

They were from a supernatural magazine from Florence. Every year they did an emotional interest piece based on the theme of the year. This year’s theme was orphan, so they decided to do a piece comparing territories by their orphanage systems and somehow Beacon Hills had gotten itself on the list. As far as he understood, they would be ranked on a myriad of criteria and it would potentially be a starting point for some Council Initiative for unclaimed children.

He almost wanted to punch whoever thought that was a good idea in the face. He parked as close to the front entrance of the compound as possible before walking to the door and knocking. The woman who opened it smiled politely at him.

“Happy Holidays Alpha Hale, come on in. Aurora has been here for a few hours now. I’m sure she’s about at her wits end.”

“Happy Holidays,” he said and followed her through the corridor that lead to the compound’s center. The crew Stiles had organized to come and decorate had done a wonderful job. It felt like Christmas had truly come even though it was only seventy degrees outside. The tree was magical in its presentation, taking up the very center of the courtyard. The sigil of Beacon Hills sitting at the very top.

He watched the news crew take pictures of the lights and festive wonder of the inner courtyard before following another member of the staff, the security officer, towards the other side. The woman who led him, opened up the main doors to dining hall and stopped to look at him.

“I warn you now, we haven’t told them you were coming.”

Of course not. They wouldn’t be expecting it either. Laura had never visited the orphanage in her time at office. Derek had come intermittently after coming back to Beacon Hills, but Talia and Claudia never had time to do more than a stop through on Christmas Day, bringing trucks of presents, magic tricks and a white Christmas. Derek had the pack shopping for presents since the beginning of the year and he had no doubt that they would all be the best-dressed children in the world.

When the door opened, all he could hear was the speech of children across different races, talking about different things. They played games in their Christmas gifts from Lydia and the woman called their attention.

“Everyone, Alpha Hale is going to spend Christmas Eve and Day with us, so be on your best behavior.”

Immediately, eyes of hundreds of children ranging from babies to teenagers were on him. He smiled at the first brave group to approach him. They were somewhere in between four and six, having all the fearlessness of children around that age, a mixed group of kids who looked up at him in wonder.

“Really?”

He nodded, “Really.”

“Help us decorate the big tree first!”

“If you don’t hurry, you won’t get to help make cookies for santa,” the woman said teasingly before whispering conspiratorially.

“Stiles asked us to save that until you got here. Have fun.”

All at once, he was taken by the hand and pulled towards the main dining hall. Two faerie children floated along behind him to where the tree was bare and all the decorations were stacked around in boxes. This would be one of several trees to be decorated throughout the compound. The main dining hall was big enough for the entire compound, but there also smaller gathering rooms for each age group that had Christmas trees, that needed to be decorated as well. Before things got crazy, he delegated work by height and ability and got the main indoor tree decorated in less than an hour. They hung decorations around the main hall before moving on to each of the smaller gathering rooms to post stockings around the room and decorate the tree. The teenagers were first, the middle schoolers, then elementary, and finally the nursery. Surprisingly, the elementary school tree went the fastest. He chocked it up mostly to the concentration of pixies and faeries.

They moved on to baking cookies. He found himself sitting at an icing table with a baby sucking on a pacifier in his lap trying his best to put his hands in the icing. They’d made at least a thousand cookies because the reindeer had to eat too and there were a lot of presents to haul to the Lodge.

And then it was play time and it took less than three minutes with the younger kids to figure out that he’d missed being around so many children at one time. They played tag in the courtyard, hide and seek through the halls. He played card and board games with the older kids and talked about their high school careers. By dinner time, he’d worked up a good appetite and Aurora lay in a cot upstairs as she’d been accidentally been blasted by a sick faerie baby. When they were settled into Christmas crafts, he checked on her to see her hair turning colors and she looked a tad sick.

“Go home Aurora, have Lenara take a look at you in the morning.”

She groaned and shuffled out. A security officer kindly drove her back to the barracks. Somewhere, he was sure, Stiles was patting himself on the back for that development as there was no doubt in Derek’s mind that she would be out for a while and therefore safely out of trouble.

“Lilith,” he called, catching her before she went back into the kitchen.

She turned curiously; she’d been running The Lodge since before he could remember. An older druid woman, not as old as Lenara, but not graced with whatever was keeping Lenara at a perpetual “early to mid-twenties” look.

“Yes?”

“I was just wondering,” he started. “When I went through all the profiles…”

Her eyes widened. There were over a thousand kids at the Lodge, more coming every day with the way things were going.

“There weren’t any lycan children, but I smell a lycan here. Was someone missed?”

Lilith gave him a sad smile than told him to follow her. It was rare for lycan children to end up in orphanages. Lycan families were usually large and easy to find because of the lycan registry. If there was one here, it would have had to have been due to a serious issue. Either everyone she was related to was dead, or her parents had broken one of lycan society’s most guarded rules: intermixing.

Though most mixed species children only inherited one or the other, especially lycan mixes who were usually lycan, lycans in general frowned upon intermixing frightened that it would dilute the “superiority” of a lycan bloodline.

It was all bullshit. Lycans, on the whole, were so trapped in their archaic way of doing things that they may have still been trapped in the middle ages.

“She’s a bit shy,” Lilith told him leading him through the rows of children, hard at work on gingerbread monstrosities, train track building, wreath weaving and a myriad of other things. “We looked through the lycan registry, but everyone was listed as confirmed deceased or they didn’t want her.”

He frowned at that. That was highly unusual. The need for pack and the instinct to keep family close, especially after a disaster, was one ingrained in their souls.

“How is that possible?”

“She’s… different,” Lilith said. “It was all they would say about it and as the only relatives she has are in a Council territory, we didn’t push.”

He nodded, there was no telling what _different_ would have meant for her in these times. It made him sick to think that somewhere in the world a lycan had left a little girl all by herself for such a stupid reason. Blood purity meant nothing if there was no love in the family.

“There you are, Anai,” Lilith said, pitching her voice excitedly. “Guess who came to meet you?”

The head covered in curls turned. A Christmas star hair clip, so dainty he knew only Lydia could have bought it, gleamed in the nest of deep brown curls. It was her eyes that made his heart stutter: they were different colors. One a deep blue, the other a bright green, looking up at him fearfully, hopefully before looking at Lilith who sat down in front of her on the floor in front of the large, overstuffed ottoman in front of this building’s Christmas tree, themed gold and red.

She had to be the cutest kid he’d seen in a long time, hands down. Skin a mix of earth tones touched with gold as if she was made of earth and sunlight. Her hair a mass of dark riotous curls, shaped into a cloud around her head, interrupted only by the fragile gold star secured at her temple, part of her hair curled over her face, partially hiding her left eye, that brilliant green color. She was so small, sitting on the floor with tinker toys in her pretty magenta dress with reindeer buttons. She looked as though she should be on the cover of a baby clothes magazine.

_Always hot in the streets,_ he thought wryly.

He sunk to the ground to sit beside her. From the size of her, she couldn’t have been more than two years old, if that.

“Hello Anai,” he started with a warm smile, offering his hand to her. “I’m Derek.”

“Hi…”

“Do you know who I am?” He asked watching her fidget under his gaze.

“Alpha Hale,” she said, with a nod. “I know who you are.”

Derek nodded as she took his hand and shook. He almost chuckled at the way his hand dwarfed hers, but refrained, only giving her a warm smile.

“How come you’re over here, away from everyone else?”

She looked at her toys, “I’m… different.”

“Why do you say that?”

“No one else is like me.”

Derek stifled the sound his heart made and smothered the need to gather her in his arms and snuggle her to death. She just sounded so _small_ and alone and all of those alpha and black wolf instincts weren’t happy about it. To him, she was a member of his pack and he would be remiss in his duties as an alpha if she felt so alone.

“Have you ever met anyone like you?” Derek asked, uncertain about where she stood in the lycan world.

She shook her head. She couldn’t remember much before The Lodge, except for screaming maybe and the cold. She didn’t remember much of anything and everything that she could remember was The Lodge and Lilith and the people who called her “Anai.” She remembers waking up in the middle of the night because she could hear someone drop something downstairs.

No one else at The Lodge heard things from that far away...No one else smelled things from that far away either, or saw things… She couldn’t fly, but she could do magic and that had only made it worse. She’d only been at The Lodge for a week and already she’d learned that she had no place there.

“Do you know what lycans are?” Derek ventured.

She shook her head. She’d heard the word… Lilith had been on the phone talking about a “lycan registry”, but she didn’t understand what that meant. Derek nodded and breathed out roughly before stretching out his arms towards her.

“Come here, Anai,” he said softly, carefully.

She moved to crawl towards him, careful of her toys and let him gather her in his arms and move to chair behind them. For a while, everything else is quiet except for the beating of his heart beneath her ear. He smells familiar in a way and safe. He’s warm and comforting.

Derek smiled at the low rumbling coming from the little girl. The poor girl was probably touch-starved. An orphanage, no matter how caring, was no place for a lycan child so young. While lycan children generally began shifting as early as five years old, they needed the stability of pack and comfort to manage that transformation. The Lodge for all its comforts was no place for a baby lycan.

He shifted her in his arms, “Anai, you’re a lycan. It means that your soul is a wolf.”

She rumbled and nuzzled against him, relaxing in his arms.

“That’s nothing to be ashamed or fearful of,” he said and shifted her to sit in his lap, her legs tucked under her and her eyes looking at him.

“You’re sure?” She asked, looking down at the folds of her skirt. “It doesn’t feel like it… I’m the only one here.”

Derek swallowed thickly. There were no words to explain that she shouldn’t be here at all and his wolf refused to let her be here, alone, much longer.

_What?_ He almost snorted. His wolf was already attached and protective of her, not surprising in the least.

“I can’t offer an answer for that,” he said honestly. “But I can tell you that you’re in good company.”

She frowned and looked at him, blinking at his glowing red eyes. Something snapped, a surge of something like familiarity and comfort, or excitement and peace. She found herself smiling brightly, toothless up at him.

_Toothless?_ She was younger than he thought, but far more eloquent than she should have been at that age. She was definitely half something else, but the fact that it manifested so clearly made her more special than he thought before. Lilith had done the right thing, not pushing. A true lycan mixed child was a rare thing and would probably be worth a lot on the black market.

“Alpha Hale,” he said. “My mother was a lycan. My whole family is lycan and so am I.”

He offered her a hand, “You’re in very esteemed company.”

She laughed, mouth open and so adorable as her eyes began to glow that beta amber and he felt the beginnings of a pack bond beginning to form.

“Give me five.”

“What for?”

“For being in awesome company,” he said with a grin.

She smacked one tiny hand on top of his with a smile before slumping back against him and asking him questions. What did Alpha mean? How come his eyes turned “glowy red”? Would her eyes turn red too? What did it mean for her soul to be a wolf? Did that mean she was going to grow ears and a tail?

They stayed up a little longer than usual until she’d finally tired herself out and fell asleep. Happy and oddly content, Derek fell asleep as well, a hand on her back, keeping her there and keeping himself grounded. She would sleep well into the next day. Sometime during the night, Lilith put a blanket over them and reclined the chair back, smiling at the picture they made.

_She’d be so proud of you,_ she thought with a smile before leaving to help set up the gifts for the next day.

*

“IT’S CHRISTMAS!!!!!!”

Waking up to Scott screaming, bursting through the doors with a big bag over his shoulder and a santa hat on his head was not how he expected to wake up. Yet there Scott was, running through the halls with pixie children running after him straight to the main hall. It was a miracle that Anai had not woken up considering Scott’s lung capacity, but she remained sleeping against him, maybe exhausted and far too comfortable to be disturbed.

He carried her upstairs and let a caretaker change her clothes and deposit her back in his arms.

“If it means she’ll sleep,” she said. “I’ll do anything at this point.”

Derek nodded in understanding before following the throngs of children to the main hall where the pack, including Stiles was helping to get everyone’s gifts to them. Wrapping paper went up in ribbons, laughter and squeals of excitement went through the air. Then there was breakfast and everyone was busy putting their things away. Anai woke up sometime in the middle of breakfast. Upon seeing what they were planning to feed her, Derek took charge to make her actual lycan baby food.

He’d wondered why she was so light. Cream of wheat wouldn’t cut it. He’d have to speak with Lilith about what they should be feeding her. Stiles brought a stack of steaks for Derek, one extra than the number Derek usually ate meaning the Stiles knew about Anai and that had been the real reason that he was there.

When one of the staff members saw him grilling steaks with Anai in his arms, they offered to take her.

“No need,” he said with a grin. “Anai’s gonna hang out with me today... and eat real food.”

To the woman’s horror, he dragged the blender forward on the counter threw in two sunnyside up eggs, beef broth and slices of steak before setting it to blend. Anai’s stared raptly at the blender, her eyes glowing as the staff member’s jaw dropped.

“Are you… blending a steak?’

“Yes.”

“For…her?”

“Yes,” he said stopping the blender when it was fully pureed and pouring the warm mixture into a bowl.

“But…. she’s a baby…”

“She’s a lycan baby,” he said with a smile. “She needs the protein.”

She watched on, beyond confused as Derek settled himself and Anai at the table, setting her in the high chair and began to feed her. It was obvious that Anai had no idea what was going on, but her eyes glowed and something in her recognized that she was being fed something worthwhile. At first taste, she growled happily and it was no fuss to get her to eat more. They ate breakfast in companionable quiet that way ignoring the looks of confusion from the staff. Stiles only grinned at the picture they made. It was good for them both. Lycans needed other lycans around.

After breakfast, everyone rushed outside to the snow covered courtyard. The snow was fake of course, as usual, but piled up so the kids could play and build snowmen. Stiles stood grinning on the sidelines of the snowball fight Derek had been dragged into by the mischievous sixth grade pixie brigade. He and Anai, along with a few other children, gave a valiant effort against the onslaught and won.

The rest of the pack left to handle other things and attend their own species‘ celebrations with the exception of Erica and Stiles. Erica went with Kira for Christmas and negotiations. Stiles was off fielding calls so Derek could have time at The Lodge. He was sure that the journalists had gotten all the family-feel good pictures they needed for the spread and of course all their questions answered about the logistics of the Lodge, so Stiles didn’t feel bad about leaving.

Anai remained attached to Derek for the rest of the day, helping her open her presents, feeding her, and generally soaking up some alpha lycan attention. When he tucked Anai in for the night, he left his jacket wrapped around her and headed home, he felt oddly… lighter. As if some of the Christmas cheer had reached him in a way that it hadn’t in years. He looked up at the face of The Lodge, another building built from Hale and Heironim and renovated with Hale Insurance money, and breathed. His wolf wanted to go back and watch over Anai, but he knew that wasn’t feasible. The beginnings of a pack bond had begun to form, but he couldn’t rush something so precious as it could be dangerous for her as well as for him.

Lycans were meant to learn social interactions through pack bonding at a young age, failure to do so could have disastrous consequences for a lycan. Having a bond form and broken had the potential to be much worse. From what he guessed of her age, judging by her lack of teeth and coordination, there hadn’t been enough time to form a bond with her birth parents, whoever they were.

Those questions would have to wait. It was late on Christmas day and he hadn’t been home in two days. Derek drives to the Hale House. It feels empty, less a place for remembering and more a mourning place and takes a deep breath before backing away out the driveway from it. It was late so going back to The Lodge wasn’t a good idea. He would be spending plenty of time there in the near future and they had his personal number if Anai needed anything.

But he didn’t want to be alone just yet, so he drives to the barracks. The noise inside tells him that they’ve broken out the video games, the Xbox Kinect to be specific, and are playing the kind of fighting game that makes them all break out into giggles: some new knock off of classic Mario which requires you to pelt your opponent with balls of fluff.

“I can’t believe they had the nerve to tell me that!”

“Well, what did you tell them?”

Kira tossed another ball straight into Lydia’s avatar’s face, ending the round with a solid win.

“Well, then I whipped out the sword.”

“You didn’t.”

“I did.”

Derek collapsed on the couch beside Scott who was stuffing his face with caramel popcorn, Jackson on the other side with a bowl of the same. Both of them are glowing just a bit.

“Sounds like old tactics work the best,” Scott said and offered Derek popcorn from another bowl. “Want some? Isaac says it’s the best.”

He takes a sniff and only smells meat and savory spices before taking a handful of it. It tastes like steak and pork and _delicious._

“What the hell is this?”

“Gifts from Stiles,” Scott said pointing to the large box on the other side of the room. “He left the territory a little after we left The Lodge to wherever and the box appeared shortly after.”

Derek nodded, “When will he be back?”

“Dunno,” Scott told him. “I don’t think it’s a business call though. He probably went to go visit his grandmother. It’s probably a Stiles thing.”

Derek nodded and pulled a notepad onto his lap, listening to the banter, how they talk about the state of affairs and the issues they see coming while throwing angry birds across the screen, or balls of fluff, or punching the air and the avatars on the screen that oppose them.

He finds himself smiling and beginning to write the State of Territory Address. He’d written a version, it sounded all fire and brimstone, destruction and terror. It spoke of hopelessness and despair and that wasn’t what Beacon Hills needed. They needed...

“Boom!” Scott cheered as the balloon exploded on the screen and his avatar did a dance. Jackson glowered at him. “Pixie wins again!”

_This_ , he thought with a smile. And maybe, just a little, watching the Pack and joining them in playing the game, he understands why the State of the Territory Address was always… so ridiculous.0  

When in darkness, when uncertain, no one needed more darkness… They needed truth, they needed reality, but they also needed that bit of light… Just enough to remind them that there was something beyond it.

So, rather than the serious address he’d planned, he drafts something that seems more like a skit to him and he can almost feel his mother with him as he does so.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 0) The State of the Territory Address is a tradition established by the Council as something that every territory should have in moments of crisis. It’s on the list of things that qualify a territory as a territory: a sense of organization. In other territory’s, it’s taken very seriously, but in Beacon Hills it has traditionally been used as a “Fuck You” to the council because there is always a crisis in Beacon Hills that no one outside of Beacon Hills could ever comprehend and that everyone in Beacon Hills knows about exactly when it happens.  
> 


	13. New Alpha on the Block

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Derek is his mother's son

Aurora has to be taken to the hospital because of the amount of the faerie light she’d been blasted with. It seemed to have been screwing with her in ways that were making her sick, so she isn’t present for the State of the Territory Address.

Stiles is in the kitchen when he wakes up in the lofts from the pile of bodies in the living room, making breakfast for the Pack. He shifts Erica’s head from his shoulder to Boyd’s chest. Allison’s arm off his leg, Scott’s head off his stomach, Jackson over and slips into the kitchen wondering exactly how Stiles is managing to not make any noise.

“Hey,” Stiles said with a grin. “You ready?”

Derek swallowed thickly and directs his eyes to the ground. He’s written the words, they aren’t hard to remember. He also has the original version of the speech he’d planned to ready. He knows that he won’t read either of them. He knows that Talia and Claudia never did so. He swallowed again and stalked towards the refrigerator. Stiles’s hand covers his own, pale, small over his own, but ultimately humanoid as opposed to the growing claws of Derek’s own hand.

“Hey,” he said gently and turned him slowly so their eyes meet.

Stiles watches them flicker, gold and green swirling and near wet, there are tinges of red bleeding in and he sees the agitation and threat of Derek’s wolf beginning to emerge.

“Breathe,” he said softly. “Just breathe.”

Derek does as he’s asked and is almost shocked when Stiles pulls him forward to wrap his arms around his waist and squeeze.

“Now take the Stilinski hug. I hear they’re the best.”

He snorted a bit and lets Stiles hold him, this close he can smell Stiles. There’s something missing, a facet of his scent that’s missing, but he doesn’t smell bad. It’s just on the edge of comforting and oddly familiar. He wants to say that they’ve met before but can’t remember honestly. At the same time, he can see the dark in at the back of Stiles’s neck. It’s curved, just the top of some image or crest. He can’t see anything but maybe a letter or two?

_…alib_

When he draws back, he feels more settled, at ease and his claws have retracted. His heart stutters a bit at the realization that Stiles…

Stiles is his anchor…

He grinned up at him and turned back to the stove to pull the steaks off the grill. There are eggs and a stack of pancakes so tall that Derek isn’t sure how they’re still standing up that way. Stiles carries it to the table, adding a bowl parfait, syrup, honey, sugar, and a pot of coffee and tea on the table.

The pile of bodies begins to move and shuffle towards the bathroom and back to the table. It takes only a few moments for everyone to be animated and awake. They look at Stiles who is moving towards the bathroom at the end of the hall with a bag over his shoulder.

“My god,” Scott started, pulling the bowl of parfait towards him. “Stiles layers!”

Jackson isn’t sure what’s in the bowl, but when Scott spoons him out a few huge dollops into a bowl and shoves it into his hands he knows that he has no choice but to eat it. Derek tears into his steak and eggs with a pleased hum. Four steaks later, he’s full and Isaac is grinning, leaning back against his chair with a sigh.

“I am so ready to take on the day.”

“Good,” Lydia said, standing, “Cause it’s time to get dressed.”

Isaac and Scott groaned, “Maybe not that ready.”

Jackson shakes his head and drags Scott towards his room while Allison tugs Isaac along. Erica, Kira and Lydia chat for a while longer before leaving to shower and get ready for the day. Lydia directed Derek towards his bedroom, where his clothing for the address was waiting.

Stiles came back, fully dressed in the ensemble he was regulated to and the dual bands around his wrists. They’d already placed their dishes in the dishwasher and cleaned up leaving Stiles enough time to slide on his glasses, lean against the bar and continue from where he left off. He was nearing the end of the passage when Lydia came strutting out with the rest of the Pack who honestly looked like they should be on the cover of a magazine, not running around the territory after people.

“Red really does suit you,” Lydia said with a smile as they came in. “Very chic.”

He grinned, “I was dressed by a strawberry blonde goddess, how could I not look good?”

She beamed at him, but let him get back to his reading. He’d just finished when Erica let out a wolf whistle and a cat call.

“Yo’ Alpha!” She called out. “Can I get yo’ number!?”

Kira whistled earning a wry chuckle and a light blush over Derek’s face who looked like he actually shaved. While not a suit, it was more formal than his leather jacket. He looked as though he was off to handle business somewhere. Stiles grinned at turned the screen off his tablet before crossing the room to grab the last box.

“An early Christmas present,” he said in explanation handing out smaller boxes from inside. They opened them and it was Allison who laughed.

They were all sunglasses, not the exact same as Derek’s aviators but all indicative of their own style with black out lenses. Stiles told them that he’d meet them in the city center later and then he was off.

Derek took a deep breath and slid on his shades, everyone else followed his lead and they walked towards the town center where seats were set up and the press had already arrived, not only from Beacon Hills, but from everywhere. He could see Stiles moving around, greeting people, tapping microphones and getting everything ready.

Lenara and Charlie stood off to the side of the stage, watching them come in and smiled. Derek was learning. The whispering of the crowd and the talk of the reporters quieted down as they marched on stage and lined up, presenting themselves to the crowd and all of Beacon Hills. When Derek arrived at the podium, he removed his shades and gave everyone a charming smile.

 _You can do this,_ Stiles thought with a grin as their eyes met. He gave him a small nod. Boyd pulled out his phone and started the recorder.

“Nine score and thirty years ago, Alpha Hale and Emissary Heironim had a record for the shortest State of the Territory Address: nine minutes and fifty-nine seconds. I understand that there are some serious things that you all would like me to address, but I’m ambitious—Five minutes tops. 1”

There’s a laugh that trickles through the crowd and somehow it’s enough to get Derek to keep talking, keeping half a mind on the second ticking by on his watch, and half on the terror in his heart. He want to tell them the truth, that he has no idea, that they may all be doomed, that they should all be prepared for the days of terror ahead, but he smiles instead. That old poke face routine that was more honest that anything he could write.

“I don’t know if any of you older cats noticed, but we’ve had a barrier for the last nine years. Thanks Emissary Heironim for always looking out for the fam’.”

Derek tapped his chest twice and lifted his hand towards the sky before looking back towards the crowd who chuckled a bit. The gust of wind that answered him was oddly comforting and encouraging.

 _They understand_ , it told him. _And it’s okay to lean on that._

“Now if you’re newer to Beacon Hills, you probably knew about it. Whether you knew about it or not, it’s like the London Bridge right now-- falling down. Yes, those holes you’ve been seeing are real. Sorry to burst your barrier.” He grinned, “The Council forgot we’re a mafia family and the two hundred plus years of us kicking their asses that precede the barrier. For our new additions, please look around you—you should see a poker face of fearless strength. That is a two hundred plus year conditioned response to this address. Get with the program. This mafia doesn’t run anywhere but to danger-- like super Boov. That’s new. You’re welcome.” 2

“I admit there are some scary things in the Hostiles, but you’ve never seen scary until you’ve seen Scott after he’s eaten ten bags of twizzlers. As such, we’ve asked some dragons to assist us in plugging the holes, until we can find a better solution. They’re resisting, but to quote Alpha Hale, _it’s all love and if you really cared about the territory, you would be here for us! We see how it is and our pixies are still not for sale_.3”

 “As expected, the Council still hates us, just like the founders always wanted. I had a meeting with the Council a while ago and all you need to know is that I’m my mother’s son.”4

Loud round of cheering goes up through the crowd as he expected, mostly from the pixies in the crowd. Those who were there for those tumultuous times laugh and nod approvingly, clapping for him. He guess he’d finally joined the ranks of unruly Hales.

 “There will be another meeting with them. Same locus operandi as the Incident: city hall.”

“We all know Alpha Hale and Emissary Heironim intended that place for serious territory business… We were thinking of turning it into a game room. Game systems on each floor by ranking, offices as karaoke spaces, conference room becomes the bar. We see it as a chance to bond with the Council and if those talks fail, we’ll all have plausible deniability. Win-win.”5

The answering “Hell Yeah” makes him grin because obviously Beacon Hills was a territory who knew how to drink.

“If you look around in the crowd there are more than a few new faces… probably closer to a few thousand. They are all here for a reason…Have you seen my face?”

Erica snorts and wonders if that was supposed to be funny. Stiles shakes his head, Derek thought it was a joke, a nod his mother and Laura’s running streak of “Hottest Alpha of the Year” in the years they were submitted, but he had no idea how true it was. A lot of people came to Beacon Hills for the chance to see Derek in person.

“You don’t think I wear leather jackets because I’m cold, do you? More people—more taxes—more money in the pockets of my leather jackets… That’s the look-like-a-million dollar secret. Because even when there are dragons trying to burn everyone to a crisp, _we always handle the situation in high fashion_.6” He adjusted his jacket and cleared his throat, “They are also here because Beacon Hills is awesome.”

He pointed to the nearest journalist from out of territory before she had a chance to speak, “Yes, you can quote me on that later.”

“Now there are a lot of people out there trying to steal hearts, in that knife and carve kind of way—yeah, it’s not pretty. Since this kind of thievery is at an all-time high, you should expect the number of people in Beacon Hills to be at an all-time high. Which means the weather is probably going to also be at an all-time high, but we’ll make it.7

“In more uplifting news, you have an Alpha who understands his job as much as a baby understands they don’t need to see everything. And since I see a couple of babies fighting with their parents right now, you understand exactly what I’m talking about.

 “Yes, we did hire Stiles, territory prankster one and chief spaz, as our consultant. Prankster Two, also known as the flower god, was already in the Pack. You should have seen it coming. The Council Stooges will be presenting their ever-consistent Shakespeare. Same place, same time.8

“Granted, I can’t really blame them for thinking that this group behind me is unfit to help anyone keep their territory safe. I’m pretty sure Erica’s sex-crazed, even for a vampyr. Scott and Jackson spend most of their time fighting over sugar-- I can see you two.”

They freeze and only offer guilty smiles to Derek’s turned back and the crowd as they place the snack basket behind their backs and try and regain the look of mock authority they were attempting for.

“Lydia cares about nothing but fashion. We’re in Beacon Hills, not Milan during fashion week. Isaac doesn’t read memos. Look at his face--way too serious to match my speech.”

Isaac continued looking stoically at the crowd while Lydia did in fact look as though she’d stepped off the runway.

“Kira only had one job: watch Scott. She failed. Allison ignores memos. We told her to leave the weaponry at home _._ ”

Allison, despite her high fashion appearance, was in fact armed to the teeth as if she was anticipating war to break out in the middle of the speech itself.

“Boyd also only had one job: resist Erica. If you weren’t holding the stopwatch, you’d be useless _._ ”

Boyd snorted and Erica only shrugged. She was a vampyr dating an oracle, what did anyone expect.

“What the Council doesn’t know is that secretly they’re the Young Adult Titans: they keep their tights under their clothes. Kissing of babies—check. Swooning women—maybe not check cause banshee, kitsune, vampyr, hunter… yeah. I’ve got the swooners, for I too am a Titan, just as sure as Lenara harasses people of a certain age and attraction level, _we take care of bidnis_.9”

Someone let out a wolf whistle and Derek only grinned at his territory. At least someone was listening and while he felt as though he wasn’t saying anything worthwhile, it meant something. The anxiety around the speech seemed to ebb out of him as his eyes flickered to Stiles who only grinned and gave him a thumbs up.

“They think we’re ass out in the wind right now, little do they know that running around naked is standard operation for Beacon Hills--can’t get blood on the digs that we bought with territory money. I know it seems dark, but that’s because we haven’t paid the light bill in about nine years. They are actually repossessing the barrier. Jokes on them though all of our lights will be free when we fix it.  You’re welcome.” He gestured to the West of the stage, “Also, the sun is actually setting if you will look to the West.”

No one looked but the laughter was in full affect. The journalists were floored and the Council member who’d come to attend looked pissed off. Good, the fuckers deserved it.

“Finally, we had to upgrade the Bentley. It wasn’t big enough. Bring it out!”

The forest green Bentley from Talia and Claudia’s last state of address had been upgraded so that it was now a stretch limousine that hovered across the ground. As it coasted to a stop, the top pulled back to reveal the earth brown, leather seating inside and the mini bar stocked with every manor of liquor imagineable.

“Nice, isn’t it? Unfortunately, there will be an air tax associated with the cost, but at least we’re spending your money wisely.”10

Looking out across the crowd, he could tell the natives from the new people. The natives were laughing, cheering… the new people looked absolutely horrified and he was pretty sure that was because they hadn’t received their first paycheck. Beacon Hills was a tax-free, non-profit territory. The Alpha and official emissary didn’t ever collect a salary for their work. Every “tax” was a dividend of Beacon Hill’s profits of the year, a bonus provided by the territory after any other projects were taken care of such as the gifts for The Lodge.

“With that said,” he slid on his shades and said, “We have parties to attend. We’ll be touring the territory in this puppy starting Tuesday into the New Year if you have questions.”

“Pack, roll out.” Derek picks up the microphone and turns to Boyd.

“Boyd—time?”

“Four minutes and fifty-four seconds.”

Derek drops the mic on the ground beneath the stage as the crowd stands up and cheers. The natives in the crowd stand, scream, cheer and clap as they get into the floating Bentley and tell Winston, who’d been the driver of the Bentley in the last State of the Territory Address, to drive them to the lofts.

Stiles grinned and nodded, watching them float away from the gathering place towards the lofts. Once the journalists are escorted to the transport circle and the council representative is gone, he crossed the center of town to go to Lenara’s house and falls on to the couch, twitching as his magic rubs against the wards on his back. He feels them, activated and annoyed. His babcia told him, in no uncertain terms, that being back in Beacon Hills was filling him more magic than they were designed to contain and there was no option to get a stronger set.

 _Those are the strongest without putting a serious cramp in your magic,_ she’d said with a sigh.

He needed to expend some energy and luckily for him his phone rang.

“Hello Gia,” he started with a grin.

“Busy?”

“Winding down a bit.”

“Great, come over for dinner. Take a break before you go galavanting off with the Pack.”

He grinned and told her he’d be over after he checked in with the Pack. When he tells them where he’s going, he doesn’t appreciate the way they look at him: knowing.

“What?”

“Go get your freak on,” Erica said with a grin and nudged Derek. “You should take a lesson out of his book. No wonder he’s so zen.”

He also doesn’t appreciate that all everyone thinks he does when he’s with Gia and Pierce is have sex because that isn’t the case! They’d had a raunchy three days of sex, but every other time, he’d gone just to talk to someone new in Beacon Hills and hear their complaints and complain about his dad to someone else, someone older who could give him some insight… It didn’t help that they were interesting and very intelligent people that had more to offer about the politics of the last three years than most people in Beacon Hills as they’d been a part of the provisional pack between Laura and Derek’s control of Beacon Hills. No one in the police department would tell him how much of a nervous wreck his father had been when his letters didn’t come every week. Or the turmoil that had lead to the pack’s assembly… the way that Derek had risen to power.

They hadn’t had sex since that first time and Stiles had found that he didn’t really have a problem with it. After all, he wasn’t just the guy they picked up at Wicked anymore. There was more there.

“Did you… know my mom?”

Gia snorted, “Your mom? She was the best, she’s the one that fought for us to get married.”

Pierce nodded, smiling fondly, “She was very supportive of me and Gia.”

Gia told the story the best, Stiles thought, as Pierce was too busy gazing lovingly at Gia and stoking a warm hand down her neck. She’d been a bit of a vampyr prodigy, but she had no interest in being a part of any of the existing covens. She wanted to do something useful for the whole territory with her gift. Her parents had insisted that she join the conven she was born into… but that also meant that she could marry Pierce.

“She told me to tell them to go fuck themselves and if I couldn’t she would.”

Stiles laughed, the image was hilarious as Gia sighed, “She got me involved with the Center for Domestic Abuse and Trauma as a Counselor, I went to school for it and the rest is pretty much history. “

“And you?”

“Your mom was there to help me reign in what was left of my family after an attack in Texas.”

Stiles nodded, “Didn’t picture you to be from Texas.”

He grinned, “No one ever does. But she was there on some basic emissary mission and helped out. It was a hate crime against the weres in the community. My family made up most of the police department and the security details so we got the brunt of it while trying to get everyone out. It didn’t work out very well.

“I lost a lot of my family that day… and being the oldest, the responsibility sort of fell to me to keep everyone together…Never mind that I had just barely turned 18.”

Stiles nodded solemnly, he had a feeling that Pierce and Derek should talk and get to know each other as he was sure that they would have a lot to share about coming into power way too young and under terrible circumstances.

“She also… happened to introduced us,” Pierce said with a grin and Gia laughed.

“She did, I think she’d planned that well.”

Stiles nodded, he was sure that he got his scheming ways from his mother and he was sure his father agreed.  Pierce had just gotten everyone moved to Beacon Hills, needing the safety and stability of an area with a high supernatural concentration, and practically lured there by Claudia.  There had been weeks of working ot get everyone moved in, settled, registered for school, therapy, finding jobs and the like. Most of the family completely left the security business after the incident.  Pierce had closed down the family business, sold the building to someone in the area and packed up to move. Their contracts were now stationed out of Beacon Hills and it wasn’t that long of a transition period.

It had been a fresh start actually…And then Gia had strolled into his office with Claudia Hieronim wearing the mark of her coven, though she looked more disgruntled about it than anything.  He remembered the day fondly the was he’d swelled with pride when Claudia pronounced his place of business the safest place to talk in Beacon Hills to hide and Gia had looked at him warmly as he escorted them both to one of the magic rooms they usually rented out for important conversations.

“That would explain the opulence…”

Pierce grinned, “We’re good at security.”

Gia smiled, “He is. I’ve never felt safer.”

There’s a low purr in Pierce’s chest and a flicker in the man’s eyes that says that he’s pleased with the praise. Gia even goes as far as stroking his arm with a smile as Stiles busies himself in the kitchen making a ridiculous pot of pasta. It’s so good that Pierce offers to get him off as much as he wishes for the next three weeks if he’ll hand over the full recipe, including the special ingredients.

Stiles laughs, “You don’t have to bribe me, but I’ll take that.”

It’s Gia who grins and promises him all the orgasms he can handle for his pie recipe. Who knew that his culinary skills would lead to him getting laid… He should have had random days to hand out food while he was in high school.

He woke up in their spare bedroom and called his Dad to notify him that he was in fact still in Beacon Hills, just spending the night somewhere else.

“With those people who tamed you?”

“Dad,” Stiles started. “We are not starting this.”

“Can they be trusted?”

Stiles rolled his eyes, “Mom trusted them.”

That seemed to be the end of the conversation before he added, “Just don’t show up looking like you’ve been jumped again, alright?”

Stiles grinned, “Thank you.”

He cough uncomfortably and they exchanged staunch “love yous” before hanging up. Gia was up making coffee in the kitchen as Pierce was on the balcony on the phone.

“Work call?” Stiles asked.

She nodded, “It shouldn’t last long… Got any fantastic breakfast surprises?”

Stiles snorted, “You’re about to have your mind _blown_.”

She licked her lips, “I could do that for you too if you’d like.”

Stiles laughed it off, but before he’d even gotten a mixing bowl out, she was on him, pushing him up against the counter and getting his pants down to take a sinful lick up his shaft. He cursed low in his throat, but didn’t fight it. _Who the hell would?_ He wondered, his mind dizzy with the feel of her mouth on him.

He saw Pierce’s eyes tinged with a bit of red, narrowed angrily and then coming around into the kitchen. The anger shifted to hunger quickly.

“G’,” he started with a growl. “Really?”

She moaned and Stiles felt it rushing up his spine as he tried to hang on for sanity. Pierce watched and Stiles watched the swelling in his low lounge pants, licking his lip and earning Pierce’s predatory smile.

“What? You want me to put you on your knees?”

Stiles heard himself give out a very manly whimper as Gia slid his dick down her throat and swallowed.  His orgasm felt like a punch to the gut, knocking the air and stability out of him. Gia hummed and kissed his lips gently as she stood and helped to steady him.

“Quite a show, G’.” Pierce said. “All for me?”

“You could use it,” Gia said with a smile. “It’s about that time in the week.”

Pierce snorted and kissed her cheek. It took a few moments to steady himself enough to remember what he’d planned on making…

Egg…something…

“Soufflés?” Gia supplied, leaning on the counter with a smug look.

“Just you wait,” Stiles promised. “You’ll get it.”

Gia purred and shivered, “Promises, promises…”

Pierce laughed as Stiles began working on a culinary masterpiece he was sure. They turned out to be egg soufflés with significantly less bread than the ones at Panera bread and far more meat and cheese… Gia groaned at first bite.

“Must have recipe,” she said. “We need you here. You looking for a job? You could be a chef and sex slave.”

Pierce ginned as Stiles shook his head, “You would like that second part way too much wouldn’t you?”

Gia grinned, showing her fangs and a devilish glint in her eyes.  Pierce, to his credit, refrained from putting Stiles on his knees until later that night after a particularly grueling day at the office and the fact that Gia wouldn’t be home until around midnight. Apparently, this was something that didn’t happen often, but grated his nerves when it did.

Stiles couldn’t remember enjoying something so much as the way Pierce praised him for swallowing. Perhaps Lenara’s dream about how well Stiles sucked cock (besides the fact that it was Derek’s cock in the dream) was partially a dream and part empathetic vision. When Gia arrived home, she was all domination and no compromise—tying Stiles up  to a cross in the couple’s playroom and making him watch as she fucked Pierce stupid across a bench with a sizeable red strap-on. He wondered how often this happened.

“Often,” Gia said when they were soaking in the tub afterwards, trading gentle caresses and soft kisses.  “Pierce gets so tense at work.”

Pierce lets out a low hum and Stiles knows that _tension_ is just a euphemism for stressed out, mourning and a whole bundle of tangled emotions.

It was rather weird to have them both invite him into their bed and huddle so close to him.

“It’s your magic,” Gia said with a low hum. “When you’re content, it just feels like contentment and safety.”

Pierce nodded and snuggled closer, “Like Claudia.”

He let the smile happen and felt himself sink into sleep.

*

_Gentle, so gentle that Lenara wondered if Stiles would break in those hands… pale beneath tang hands the flipped him over and caressed him gently._

_“Stiles,” a voice whispered as a flush swept over his face and his head hung forward. As the vision cleared, Lenara recognized the hand and arm as Derek’s, the body was Derek’s and those eyes that glowed like pools of blood beaming through the darkness._

_“Derek_ ,” _Stiles gasped shifting a bit. Derek growled low in his chest and sunk his blunt human teeth into Stiles’s shoulder. A hand on his hip, the other around his neck as his body surged forward. A spike of fullness and pleasure went through her as Stiles gasped and moaned._

_His hands clenching the sheets as Derek thrusts into him, slow and gentle._

Dasha groans awake to see Lenara above him, pulling his boxers off with quick fingers. There’s the smell of sex and desire in the air and Dasha swallowed.

“What did you see?”

“Sterek,” she replied with glowing violet eyes as she crawled on top of him. “ _Very sexy Sterek._ ”

*

Stiles is getting ready to head to city hall to speak with Derek about the  when there’s a hurried knock at the front door. He frowned and went to answer it to see Dasha looking harried, blissed out and a little angry. She glares at him and leans against the doorway. She looks utterly exhausted and a little high.

“Dasha? What’s wrong?”

“Lenara… and her premonitions… _I can’t sleep_.”

He frowns and lets her in. She stumbles on to him and he helps her walk to collapse on the couch with a sigh.

“Just fuck the Alpha already,” Dasha sighs while falling asleep. “It’s getting to be an all day and all night kind of deal.”

Stiles winced with sympathy before finding a better pillow and a blanket for her to snuggle under.

Stiles wondered secretly if Lenara had been cursed to need sex everyday for the rest of her life or something… Or maybe she was just half succubus. That was… probably more likely…. Dasha was a pure druid girl he thought, but there were times he doubted even that. Seeing her exhausted now and the odd shimmer over her, he definitely doubted it. Peering closer, he saw two sets of ley lines within her. One hidden beneath the other, but they didn’t seem to be connected.

Interesting.

His conscious would let her stay there so he cast a quick spell to drift her upstairs to his bedroom where she could sleep comfortably. He closed the door behind him, left a note for his Dad and climbed into the jeep. He’d gotten to the first light when Lenara called him asking after Dasha.

“Is she okay?”

“She’s exhausted,” Stiles told her. “Are you alright?”

“No, I’m not. I can’t stop. Just… let her stay for a while? If she’s around…”

Stiles smiled, “I know. She knows you don’t mean to.”

Lenara sighed, “I don’t but… this premonition is persistent.”

Stiles knew what that was like and shook his head telling her that he’d keep an eye on Dasha for as long as necessary before hanging up. The phone rang again before he could even set his phone on the seat beside him. After three calls in succession, he made the executive decision to stop at the nearest store with an electronics department to purchase a headset. He decided on the kind that say around his neck rather than the ear mounted kind if only to look less like an asshole.

Another call comes in while he’s walking into city hall and oddly, it’s from Charlie.

“Hey Charlie, what’s up?”

“Huge favor,” she started. “Need you to be Derek’s secretary and page for a little bit. Family emergency had to leave.”

“Sure thing, when will you be back?”

“Probably after the new year.”

Looked like he wouldn’t be taking any assignments until she came back then, but it wasn’t a big deal. At the end of the year, territories weren’t looking to really solve any issues, nor did they have the budget to solve them at this time of the year. The boards were significantly quieter than before.

He’s visiting Lenara before the pack got ready to get on the road when she suggests it.

“Why not just be his secretary and personal assistant?”

Stiles snorted, “And what difference do you see between that and what I do now?”

“More alone time. This about all that face time.”

Stiles rolled his eyes, but now that it was in his mind, he couldn’t stop thinking about it, especially when Derek spends the entire ride to the next town on the phone. Stiles only watches him for a few moments before taking Derek’s other phone, the one specifically for territory business and moving to another side of the bus. The woman on the phone has a thick draco accent and Stiles assures her that she can speak her native language and she will be understood.

He isn’t sure how long he’s on the phone, but he knows that when they stop at the next town, Stiles takes Derek’s other phone from him and tell him to go be an Alpha.

“I’ll field calls,” Stiles said. “It isn’t me this town wants to talk to.”

He looks torn but the more Stiles insists, the easier it is to let go, meet and greet people from the city in the open air and with the Christmas feeling.

“Alpha Hale,” someone called, an older man, human, who looked to be not only nervous but wary.

Derek smiled and offered a hand to the older man, “Alpha Hale was my mother. I’m Derek.”

He watches the man relax as they shake hands and Derek directs him towards food and listens to his questions.

Stiles has taken both phones away from the festivities back to the office on the bus and split his consciousness and routed calls to his own phones to answer all four phones at the same time and take notes of each conversation. It’s the first time he’s using his magic so extensively in a long time, so he’s a little high on the rush, part of him slips into a trance through the barrage of calls and concerns. The rest if returns to the fray to interact and translate, to support Derek as he’s moving through the crowd with smiles and cheer.

Aurora is somewhere running around according to her list, making sure food and things were coming out at a steady pace. By Stiles’s calculations, she’s supposed to be taking pictures and maybe taking a break to eat. So there she is with a camera dangling from her neck, coming up to Stiles’s line for salad and moving along to Derek’s for a burger. The photography students he’s recruited mill about with their cameras and of course the news reporters do as well. They’re from every territory who has any interest in Beacon Hills, including those that were sent by the Council.

The pack manned food booths and other entertainment while answering questions and talking with everyone. Jackson is manning the water slide and splash area, getting soaked by mischievous children in the process in a section warded to remain warm no matter how cool it is outside. Scott was teaching people to make holiday wreaths for their doors and maybe growing mistletoe in mischievous places. Kira shot of lightning bolts that exploded into fireworks above the city. Allison and Isaac were manning other booths for caramel apples, apple bobbing, and a myriad of other carnival games with Erica and Boyd.

Security was being taken care of by the city’s police force who looked as though they were just relieved to have them all there and getting their questions answered. About a billion pictures, handshakes, and the like later, the pack packed up to head to the next city, waving everyone goodbye and telling them to carry on with the party. Aurora passed out on the couch to catch a nap on the way to the next territory as did the rest of the pack except for Stiles who was still working to monitor all of their cell phones. He took everyone’s phone, charmed their calls to forward to one of his phones and returned them to their sleeping forms. If the call wasn’t specifically for personal business, or from another member in the Pack, they wouldn’t get and instead would be taken along with the magical call center he’d set up in the bus’s office space which he’d all but barred Derek from entering.

They manage to get through the entire territory and ended the tour in the farthest city south on New Year’s Eve. The entire pack stepped off the bus on New Year’s Eve, just after three o’clock in the afternoon in their festive clothing. The party was still getting set up and immediately, they split up to get things together. Surprisingly, they did end up kissing at least three babies each and Derek ran interference for swooning women. It was all good fun and excitement, even speaking with the were-dragon leader of the city, Raava, a woman who’d had a close relationship with Talia and Claudia.

He bowed politely and asked to sit with her. She only stood and hugged him.

“We are far past formalities dear; you’ve thrown up on me as baby.”

A flush rushed across his cheeks as she laughed, “Mind you, it was during a pretty dicey situation. No hard feelings.”9

He tried hard to regain his composure, but it was like speaking to his grandmother when he was a teenager: she knew exactly what to say to embarrass him.

“You’ve built a strong Pack, Derek. Talia would be proud.”

He smiled sadly, “I miss her.”

“As do we all,” she said with a nod. “But you aren’t alone, surprisingly Beacon Hills is more a mafia family than you think. There is a great bond here that they built and people will look to you and your Pack to continue and develop it.”

Derek nodded, “I’m doing what I can.”

“Would help if Claudia’s son would come out of hiding… at least then Heironim and Hale would be once again be in full force.”

Derek frowned, “Son?”

Raava gave him a knowing smile, “Son. You don’t remember, but you will. There are so many things left in this world to protect you both. When you remember and he comes out of hiding… the Council will wish they hadn’t orchestrated the death of them both.”

Derek swallowed thickly, and Raava looked at him before reaching forward to take his hand.

“Kate was not your fault. What happened to your Uncle was not your fault either,” she said looking him in his eyes. “They were plans in effect long before they happened. Talia and Claudia weren’t fools, they knew they couldn’t cheat death forever, rather than blaming yourself remember that they loved you and left this legacy to you because you are capable.”

“To Laura.”

“To you,” she corrected. “Don’t think for a moment that Claudia’s foresight is so short. Why do you think Laura had you remain in New York?”

He swallowed and frowned listening to her words. He hadn’t thought of it then… To sick with grief and self-loathing to even consider coming with Laura… It wasn’t until he’d felt the snap in their pack bond that he’d thought to take the first flight out of New York straight to Beacon Hills. Claudia knew? Talia knew? Knew it all? Why didn’t they say anything? Why didn’t they fight? Why wouldn’t they—

“Don’t question the past, Derek,” she said. “Learn from it.”

Derek felt something inside him clench. Claudia told him that, the night of the fire when he and Laura were huddled together, silent as the grave and angry, in the back of the jeep. Watching water pouring over the house. She’d come, found them just in time, but couldn’t save anyone else. Cora, Dad, and all their siblings, aunts and uncles, _Talia_ —gone up in smoke.

She’d come straight to them. They’d been beating at the door warded against their entry. There had been no sounds from inside. Everyone inside were already dead more than likely, but Derek and Laura hadn’t thought of it. Hadn’t heard any of that, Laura had clawed at the barrier, screamed and yelled, but to no use. When the door burned away and collapsed they saw them. Talia stabbed through with spears and arrows, hunter arrows and bullets, bodies they didn’t recognize strewn about and her body was still standing in front of the tunnel that led out of the territory. The few who’d escaped had gone straight to New York were a few distantly related members of the Talia’s family lived.

Claudia had hauled them away and out of the house, encasing them in magic and ignoring the way they screamed for Talia before she got them out of the burning house. She’d said the same thing when she drove them to the airport and put them on the first plane to New York the next morning.

“Where could he be hiding?” Derek asked. “You know where he is?”

Raava laughed, a twinkle in her eye. “It isn’t a place you can go to, but one he has to come out of himself. Don’t worry. It won’t be long.”

That was oddly comforting, yet not as comforting as it should be. But he’d been conditioned per Talia and Claudia’s State of the Territory Address to always sport a poker face. Raava grinned.

“There we are,” she said. “You’re learning.”

He laughed at that and nodded, before bidding her goodnight and heading towards the platform for the countdown to the New Year. Scott had his arms wrapped around Kira’s waist, Jackson and Lydia were looking into a selfie. Erica and Boyd were already making out and Allison and Isaac were standing so close he wanted to just tell them to kiss already. They say that you would spend the next year doing whatever you did on New Year’s Day. Honestly, he hoped that was true.

As silly as his Pack could be, as insane as Beacon Hills was, he wouldn’t trade it for anything. It was where he was from, the place that his mother built from the ground up with her best friend.

“Five!”

Stiles came running around the bend with a bottle of champagne and aimed it at the Pack. Lydia looked horrified as a group of teenagers also carrying bottles shook them and aimed.

“Four!”

“Three!”

“Two!”

“One!”

“Happy New Year, Bitches!” Stiles and his small battalion screamed and opened the bottles so champagne went flying out, soaking the pack. Lydia screamed. Kira shrieked at the cold hitting her and Derek could only laugh, shielding his face from the sticky, bubbly mess. When the bottles were empty, they tossed them in the trash and ran, the rest of the pack rushing after them as Derek was left, soaked in his very festive clothing on the platform alone, laughing as they ran around the town center and eventually pushed Stiles into the apple bobbing pool.

He resurfaced and splashed armfuls of water at Lydia, knocking her off her feet and out of her very nice, very wet, shoes. Thus, began what would be known as the New Year’s Splash War

*

When they get back to Beacon Hills City, they’ve been in the New Year for three days. Charlie grins seeing the Pack all walk in together, Stiles heading up the rear behind her on the phone and taking a detour to her desk. Aurora was still asleep and would be packing to go back to school that afternoon as classes started up on the 4th.

Charlie slid a small stack of papers towards him with a grin, “I have a job offer for you.”

Stiles grinned and got off the call, “And what’s that?”

“Derek needs a Personal Assistant.”

Stiles snorted, “Uh huh?”

“Someone he’s comfortable with and can trust… also he’ll listen to. Surprisingly, he listens to you.”

“Uh huh.”

“And more importantly, you’re good at it.”

Stiles hums a bit and looks to Derek and the Pack heading into the conference room. Erica tells him to hurry it up and Stiles tells Charlie that he’ll think about it before heading into the meeting. He took a seat, put on his glasses, opened his laptop to a new page and projected the website he was building for Beacon Hills.

It was a nice lay out honestly, elegant, classy, but completely undermined by the tag line. “Beacon Hills: Mocking the Council since before it was cool.”

Lydia laughed with a nod as Stiles walked through the site and told them what he needed from everyone. A dossier, a blurb, pictures and whatever else they wanted to put on their profile would be required. They’d post more candid photos in the photo albums as well as links to the archive of the Addresses and official talks. Prior to Derek’s occupation of the position, Beacon Hills had never participated in the education of the next generation of emissary. They had dragons raining fire down on their heads, thus no time to set up a website. Now that Derek was taking Beacon Hills towards being a territory that could be a great ally, they had to play nice a little bit. That was really all the website was for, under Derek’s direction, he removed the space for their ranks all except for Derek’s. There was no need to draw more attention to the pack, especially since there was no real ranking in the Pack. Charlie’s page was the closest to being complete, as was Lenara and Dasha’s. There were a few other key people in the territory that he wanted added to the site as well as links to other sites of interest in Beacon Hills. Stiles noted them down as well as any other suggestions that the pack had before Lydia told them all that they would be taking pictures today and the day after to get it out of the way as all of their clothes had arrived.

“I’ll be getting Aurora’s done before she leaves, so no worried there.” Lydia said primly. “I’ll get them to you as soon as I have them.”

Stiles nodded, and gave her the name of the photography students that he’d enlisted for this. They were being contract essentially as part of their work study to be the official photographers for all events and had been the main reason that they’d gotten most of the really good pictures from the territory address and an official copy of the State of the Territory address. When the meeting was adjourned, Stiles took Lydia to the second conference room where they were setting up the photo booth area. Her mother, Catherine Martin, beamed at her, hugged them both, and told them that everything was ready. She’d been kind enough to help grant them the use of some of her equipment including her contacts for the clothing.

“Anything for the fam,” she said with a smile and kissed Lydia’s cheek.

Catherine Martin had to be the most laidback Druid he’d ever met besides Lenara. How she remained married to Paul Martin all this time he could never understand. The back panel was actually a magic screen that would change to any background they chose. Lydia had plans to exploit that greatly.

“I’ll leave you to it, call me if you need me,” he said and left the room. Lydia exchanged handshakes with the crew as he left to load the other student up into the Jeep and begin to grab pictures for a few other spots. He got out in town square, split the lists and told them to make it happen. He wanted to review it all before the end of the day.

“She’ll take you anywhere you need to go,” he said grinning at the Jeep. “Don’t worry, she’s not possessed, just animated.”

With that he turned and headed towards the library with his laptop, to the study room in the far back, set up his laptop and went back to work on building the website and filtering through the images from the event. He’d posted the address on Youtube as soon as it was over and linked it to the archive of Addresses. He smiled watching the site be pulled together on the projecting board he’d cast around the room.

A knock sounded, “Come in.”

Derek opened the door and looked around at the number of pages open and wondered how exactly Stiles was working on all of them at one time.

“I see you’re busy.”

He nodded behind his glasses, “How’s it going, big guy? You alright?”

He took a seat with a deep breath and glanced around, “I’m… hanging in there. Just dropped Aurora off at the transport, so that’s one less thing I have to worry about….for now.”

He nodded, “For now.”

“How’s this coming along?”

Stiles hummed and tapped a key to open the main page where Derek could see it. The picture was an aerial of Beacon Hills from the first day Claudia and Talia stepped into California, growing and shifting through the years until the present. The date changing at the bottom of the screen to mark the shifts in the picture, the picture slid to the Inaugural picture of Talia and Heironim when they first put up the Beacon Hills sign. They looked fabulous, Claudia’s hair was short, blowing in the wind with her blood red cloak through the air. Talia’s eyes were glowing red. They were dressed at the height of fashion of the time: corsets and riding pants loose tops, riding boots. They leaned on the Beacon Hills sign on either side. Claudia with her staff out, Talia with her claws out bloody, and the warzone behind them. There were bodies of dragons strewn about, exorcism circles and all the rest there behind them and a small band of Druids around them, all laughing in the picture. He recognized Lenara there beside a man taller than her, an arm around her waist and smiling at the camera.

He smiled watching the picture flicker by. Pictures of the addresses, the one where the dragons did descend upon the crowd and Claudia spent the entire address fighting them off. Their last address was much of the same. Derek spends an hour or two talking with Stiles about the lay out of the website and the pictures he liked and didn’t. He of course got no say in his own pictures, but the aerials and pictures of Beacon Hills he gave his advisement on. In the end, Stiles had more content up and was much closer to getting the website up before the deadline on the fifteenth. Lydia had a block of Derek’s time, after his wiccan massage, for pictures.

“Are we sure we want to participate?” Derek asked with a groan.

“Think of it as more people to help babysit Aurora and maybe teach her to be useful.”

Derek only hoped that he was right about that and him not clawing someone’s face off during the massage.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) Two hundred and ten years ago was the State of Territory Address given right before a battle. They had to keep it short because there were people advancing on Beacon Hills. They won of course.  
> 2) Talia and Claudia always referred to Beacon Hills as a “mafia family” or a “gang” in retaliation to the Council labeling the territory a “band of vagabonds”. In the first State of the Territory address, Talia and Claudia established the “Beacon Hills Poker Face” which really is a look that projects “no fear” to the outside even if they’re “shitting their pants” in that moment, and show solidarity and trust that their Alpha and Emissary would take care of them. More often than not the legions attacking Beacon Hills were sent by the Council for one reason or another (usually because Claudia and Talia told them no) and were consistently defeated before stepping foot into Beacon Hills. Also, everyone should watch the movie Home...Boov are awesome.  
> 3) Dragons, the kind that eat pixies and the kind the were dragons turn into when they remain in their dragon forms too long, have skin resistant to magic and physical weapons. It is extraordinarily hard to kill a dragon which is why Claudia and Talia were revered... they killed several hundred in their lifetime. There is also a very large concentration of them in the mountains to the North of Beacon Hills and were quite insistent upon eating the pixie population. The words are a direct quote from Talia’s “negotiations” with the dragon population who suggested that they trade pixies for assistance in defending the territories. She refused them multiple time by claw and by words.  
> 4) Talia was infamous for clawing Council members, lycans, and any one who mistepped in the middle of their talks.  
> 5) City Hall is a replica of the City Hall in the Council’s most beloved territory in Vatican, Italy. It’s built in the same style but bigger with better quality materials. It was mostly a fuck you to the Council as they payed less for it.  
> 6) The quote is from the address in which the dragons did descend on the congregation. Claudia and Talia were at a conference with a neighboring territory and wearing very high fashion clothing, completely impractical for warfare and fought off the dragon horde in stilettos and lace bustiers.  
> 7) The weather reference is to the pattern of the attacks from the creatures in the Hostiles. The dragons waged war on them for three weeks straight with dragon fire. Claudia and the other Druids and Wiccans created a temporary barrier. Due to all of the heat and magic, the temperature of Beacon Hills that month went up ten degrees.  
> 8) In middle school, Stiles and Scott cursed a group, a Shakespeare cast number, of Council enthusiast to go to the middle of Beacon Hills territory at four o’clock in the morning and perform various Shakespeare plays once a year under the company name “The Council Stooges” from the time the curse was cast to the end of the Council. It has since become a territory holiday.  
> 9) After a talk, Talia was attacked on her way home. Derek was a baby and she gave him to Raava to take care of while she fended the assassins off.  
> 10) Another reference to the last State of the Territory Address. They assured Beacon Hills that their “tax dollars” weren’t being used to buy a “raggedy Toyota”, but instead used “wisely” to buy a Bentley with laptops and tv screens rigged in the car.  
> ** In case anyone is wondering, I did deliver this speech just to make sure it was under 5 minutes and yes it can be done in 4:54.


	14. Distractions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fuck the Council coming straight from Beacon Hills, young Alpha got it bad... part 1
> 
> Warning: Daddy Derek feels.

As usual, Stiles found a way to be absolutely right and completely unappreciated for it. Derek returned from his massage appointment far more relaxed than when he left. So relaxed in fact that he only rolled his eyes at the news.

“You’ve been entered into this year’s Hottest Alpha contest,” Stiles told him.

Derek rolled his eyes. Talia had held that title up until her death. Laura held it while she was alive. It had been a Hale Tradition to win that spot and apparently, Derek’s avoidance of it was now over.

“Let me guess… the suit?”

Stiles snorted. While his “Alpha Suit” looked very good on him, it wasn’t the picture that got submitted for initial consideration. Stiles opened the page of the Florentine magazine that showed him and Anai in front of the Christmas tree. Both grinning at each other, eyes glowing: hers a beta gold, his alpha red.

“This was actually the picture.”

Derek snorted, he shouldn’t have been surprised. Anai was fucking adorable. He took the magazine from Stiles with the intent to read the article.

“We’re number one, by the way,” Stiles said proudly.

“Spoiler alert,” he replied with a roll of his eyes.

“We did however submit your official alpha picture and one other candid photo for consideration.”

“Which photo?” Derek ask warily.

Stiles beamed at him and turned his tablet towards him. He groaned immediately. It wasn’t exactly the most family-friendly photo, but it was done in the Hale style. It was during a particularly difficult day while he was on patrol on the Northern border. A chimera had found a hole in the barrier and Derek, being on the edge of the full moon and _pissed off_ that it had dared to challenge him, had enjoyed himself a little too much in killing it. He was wearing jeans, a grey tank top, his standard boots, and his eyes were filled with moonlight. It wasn’t the alpha red, but something specific to black wolves, something that the Lycan community would know.

In either case, he was splattered with blood, his hands were bloody, his hair was mussed, there were rips in his shirt--

“How the hell did you get a picture of this?”

“Lenara.”

He should have known, “Is there anything else I should be warned about at the moment?”

“Nope, the website is up, plenty popular, all the social media and outreach in the world is happening…. I even got The Lodge set-up. You need anything from me?”

Derek shook his head, “Not at the moment. Please continue to do …. whatever it is I pay you for.”

Stiles snorted, “Managing your schedule, the Council, researching the barrier… eye candy?”

Derek snorted and opened his calendar to see two hours blocked out for lunch, “Do I have a meeting?”

“Yes, with a very tiny Lycan. Every day until further notice… don’t forget the weekends.”

He grinned, that was something worth working towards. He opened his email box and began with the oldest emails. Stiles left him in peace, no doubt adding a few touches to the website or monitoring something about it. He remembered flicking through it before Stiles posted it and being satisfied with the outcome. It wasn’t completely finished, but it conveyed the ambiance of Beacon Hills clearly and in a way that he was sure Talia and Claudia would approve. They didn’t have very many posed photos, most of them were candid, stolen moments of the pack doing whatever they were doing around Christmas and New Years including most of the Splash War.

When it’s about eleven o’clock, Derek shuts down his computer and drives to The Lodge. Lilith greets him at the door, telling him that they were expecting him and Anai knows he’s coming. It only been a week and since Christmas most of the staff had gotten on board with taking care of Anai. None of them were trained, but their hearts were in the proper place and given that she was too young to start shifting, they had very little to worry about. He’d bought them a second blender, one for general use and one specifically for Anai.

Anai didn’t run to him when he arrived, but gave him a toothless grin as he entered the room and a wave. He managed, somehow, to sit at the tiny table with her and eat lunch. Tiny spoonfuls of blended steak and eggs for her and a beef sandwich for him. She told him about her week coloring with the rest of the kids, how they seemed to be warming up to her now that they knew that she was a Lycan like Derek. He ends up staying longer than the two hours, getting to put her down for naptime and switching out the jacket she sleeps under before leaving to the Hale House to begin his foray into Talia’s study.

The residual peace from visiting Anai is enough to make him open the door and not weep at the old scents that lingered. Him, Laura, Cora, Talia, Claudia…. everyone who’d been lost in the fire too was there, soaked into the wood that had been protected against the fire. He’d wondered for years why this room still stood, why they hadn’t gone to it when the fire started...why they had to die at all.

Derek goes to the bookcase first, smelling the lingering scents there and looking for the books that smelled as though they’d been used most recently. Then to the desk to find anything that made any sense. Her laptop remained undisturbed on the tabletop and the most recent survey of Beacon Hills was posted on the wall in a large picture frame. He wondered how often she looked at it to gain strength for the days ahead…

Laura had never used the study when she was here; he knew that from the scents alone. Claudia however had been here… frequently while they were gone. Her scent was all over a stack of books, some opened and some closed on the corner of the desk and on the laptop.

A sticky note waved at him from the top of the stack, he lifted in with a frown and began to read.

_Dear Derek,_

_If you’re reading this, it means you’re running out of time. Take these to Lenara if he hasn’t come back yet, otherwise give them to Stiles._

_Your mother is so very proud of you as am I._

_Poker face and a steady heart._

_Love, Claudia._

His throat tightened as he set the sticky note down and all at once books began to move, closing themselves and stacking themselves on the desk beside the laptop. The laptop set itself on top of the stack as it began to hover.

 _Weird..._ he thought and began to walk. The stack followed him out of the study and out the door before piling inside the Camaro easily filling the front and back seat. When he arrives at City Hall, Charlie isn’t at her desk and Stiles has taken over the large meeting room at the end of the hall. The whiteboard and windows are filled with notes, scrolls and books are everywhere, the table is turned on its side against the wall and Stiles is sitting in the middle of the floor, chewing a pen cap and reading, a long scroll of his sprawling handwriting at his side.

“Hey Derek, what’s up?”

Derek stepped aside to let the stacks of books float into the room and set themselves up around him.

Stiles’s eye widened at the stacks, while not the number in Claudia’s office, there weren’t just a few of them. All of them noted, marked, dog-eared, and probably notated to death…

“Where’d… you get these?”

“My mother’s study.”

Stiles swallowed and placed the book he was reading aside before standing and going to Derek.

“Are you alright?”

Derek swallowed thickly and shook his head, “No… No, I’m not. But I don’t have time to deal with that. Where are you? Do you need anything? Is there anyone I can call for you?”

Stiles shook his head, “I have a meeting with the visiting Wiccans to go over their findings in about an hour, a meeting with the researchers from other territories next week. You can come to both if you like. I am going through mer-texts that I’ve borrowed from the library in Helion.”

“Helion?”

“Mer-settlement off the coast. You know they’re part of Beacon Hills too don’t you?”

His jaw dropped, “I thought it was impossible to put a barrier over water…”

Stiles shrugged, “Well, the barrier extends over all of Helion, so what does that tell you about the founder’s idea of impossible?”

Derek huffed as Stiles nudged him, “You’ve been doing some reading…”

He snorted and turned, “I’ll be back, but I think we could all use a pick me up.”

Stiles threw his hands up. Pick me ups were few and far in between….

Especially when the “best and brightest” minds of the Wiccan world insisted that the Beacon Hills Barrier was impossible.

“It’s a slap dash hack-job, I’m surprised it held this long. Even Heironims cannot cheat the laws of magic.”

Stiles did his best not to punch the Pendragon, but as he was acting as a representative of Beacon Hills and not the Heironim family, he digresses and asks for their reports on the barrier’s status.

For all their knowledge, the barrier was a mystery to them. They couldn’t identify the energy of the barrier, nor could they figure out the schematics. Some said that the fact that it extended over water, and given the mer-population, it extended over, was more than likely adding extra magical variance that could not be compensated for in the barrier.  Some believed it was simply a matter of the make-up of the territory. Beacon Hills had too many magical anomalies, magical people and the like, for any sort of barrier to remain uncompromised. It was like attacking from the inside and the outside.

“After all, territories are meant to be home to one, maybe two species at the most. This mixed bag of vagabonds you call a territory was bound to destroy whatever barrier was put around it.”

Stiles promptly whipped out a knife, a demon blade to be specific, and pressed it against the man’s throat, “Consider it a warning.”

The man went pale and silent after that. As far as Stiles was concerned, it made the meeting easier.

Then someone said something extraordinarily stupid, “It’s a simple repulsion barrier, of course. Just look at the effects of it: obviously the magic that’s been building up over the last decade since the barrier went up has just begun to wear down its strength. Not to mention it isn’t properly anchored. It’s a fool’s dream. ”

Stiles managed to throw his knife to the left of the man’s head and call the meeting adjourned. When the Pendragon left with such a haughty air, he wanted to strangle the man. He shook his head, if the children of Wicca had those to show for the “brightest minds of the Age”, then he might as well go call up Emma Watson. She _played_ a better witch than idiots with actual magic.

He sat back with a groan in his chair regarding the stack of pages with a glare.

Charlie peaked in, “Rough?”

Stiles gathered the stack of reports, “More reading to do and yes...they were absolutely useless.”

Charlie nodded, “Don’t worry, kiddo. I’m sure you’ll get it.”

He hoped so. If he kept doing minor patchwork on the barrier, they could have maybe until July, but Claudia and Talia had to have been planning the barrier for _centuries._ How were they going to figure it out in a few months?

He huffed and stacked the reports on the nearest cart before rolling it to his “Barrier Headquarters” at the end of the hall. Derek was there, sitting on the floor with a “Barriers and Wards 101” textbook in his lap and a notebook at his side.

“How’d it go?”

“I don’t even want to talk about it,” Stiles said. “I’ve got at least twenty novel length dissertations about “magical ineptitude” and arrogance to read in the hopes that there is some tiny nugget of information in there.”

“Can I help?” He asked.

“Sure, but I warn you, it’s going to be mostly in Wiccan speak.”

Derek didn’t have the first clue what Wiccan speak was, but when he lifted one of the papers and turned to the first page, he understood. It wasn’t a different language so much as an extraordinarily dense and obscure version of English. There were phrases he wasn’t familiar with and didn’t at all sound like the pseudo-technical terms he remembered from college.

“... _to place a shield over a wale’s road is to set it adrift on the currents. In doing so, the shield could turn enemy or friend, shield or net_ …”

Derek blinked and Stiles rolled his eyes, “But that’s not true.”

Derek looked at him, “Please explain… What the hell is a _wale’s road_?”

Stiles chuckled, “It’s a translation from Old Wiccan. It’s used to refer to the sea, but in this context he’s referring to the actual motion paths of sea creatures.”

A shield in general meant a barrier, but more specifically a repulsion barrier that kept enemy and friend well divided. The thought was that since repulsion barriers required an anchor and the sea could not give a specific anchor, as there were no real lines of magical delineation in water, the barrier would move, hence a barrier couldn’t be cast over the water.

“But they’re wrong. Mer-settlements have barriers if they’re big enough. They aren’t repulsion barriers, but they are defensive. Casting a barrier in water is difficult, but not impossible, thus placing one through water isn’t impossible either.”

Obviously, because the Beacon Hills barrier was very much through the water. Sea creatures passed through easily, but Stiles knew from speaking with the King of Helion and the sentry that invading groups had been repelled before they even saw the city. It was a wonder though, a barrier in water, sure. A continuous barrier through water and onto dry land, through the forest?

“How the hell did you get to Helion anyway?” Derek asked.

Stiles snorted, “They have escorts. They are a part of Beacon Hills you know. Do you remember the party on the beach the day before New Years? That was Helion.”

Well, it was nice to know that he hadn’t neglected a part of the territory during the tour. He thought they were all just human who swam a lot or lived on the ocean. He never would have guessed that he’d been speaking with merfolk.

Derek’s phone rang and Stiles watched the tick in his shoulder. The stress levels were rising. He picked up the phone and Stiles could tell it wasn’t a deadly emergency.

“I’ll be there soon, thanks Lilith.”

“Anai?” Stiles asked.

He nodded with a helpless smile, “She’s teething.”

*

Derek held her against him, soothing her irritated senses with the calmness of the office as he worked. Everything about it was were-friendly, from the cleaning supplies to the sound of the keyboard. She’d been getting more and more agitated at The Lodge as her senses grew stronger. The walls were thick enough to mute the sounds of outside as well. Even still, Derek could hear Stiles moving around in the catastrophe he called the “Barrier Headquarters”. He was probably getting ready for the next burst of research he wanted to get done regarding the barrier before heading off to meet with the research team or plan for the emissary kids in training that would be arriving in a few week’s time.

Anai’s jaws worked against the teething ring furiously and he rumbled at her to soothe her nerves before sparks began to fly again. Stiles said it was normal for Wiccan babies, when agitated, to perform some accidental magic if they were from a strong enough line. He wondered how much of Stiles’s baby magic had been because of irritation or just because he could.

Derek knew from memory that Lycan babies were most irritated when teething and the onset of the senses. So when Lilith called, concerned at the way Anai would hide in obscure places whenever someone would vacuum in the compound and she started screaming in terror, covering her ears when someone pulled up to the front of the Lodge, he knew it was about that time… That also meant that Anai was older than he thought or from a stronger line than he thought. Lycan children didn’t usually come into their Lycan senses until they were closer to shifting and their wolf was manifesting. He’d shifted the first time when he was five years old, which was extraordinarily young.

Odd that her teeth were coming in so late. It could have been due to the lack of nutrition but he doubted it.  He left the office just after the call to go to The Lodge and found Lilith in the middle of explaining that there was no such thing as gigantic wolves even though Anai swore up and down that she’d heard one.

Introducing her to Camaro had been an interesting moment and she’d delighted in growling at the car, soothed by the rumbling as he strapped her into the back seat.

“He sounds like you,” she said looking up at Derek. He smiled, kissed her head, nuzzled her gently and climbed into the front seat.

He was planning to introduce the pack to her today since she would be spending sometime living with him. Lycan teething, also known as gumming through the average teething toy, lasted anywhere between a few weeks and a few months depending on the lineage of the Lycan. Given that she was confirmed as half-wiccan, he wasn’t sure how long it would be and rather than leaving The Lodge staff with an irritable Lycan baby, he’d elected to take her.

She shifted against him. Among the other oddities of Anai, her Wiccan side didn’t seem to manifest in her scent… or maybe it was because she hadn’t gone through a wiccan “manifestation” yet either, whatever that was. Stiles hadn’t explained it.

Charlie knocked on his door, barely grazing her knuckles against the door, “Come in.”

It wasn’t her expression that gave it away, nor her tone, but her scent. There was a faint Lycan scent lingering on her, the smell of sand and desert heat. He froze, his arms tightening around Anai who was still gumming at the teething ring ferociously. She rumbled a little bit, but otherwise ignored the goings on, wrapped up in her senses and the irritation in her mouth.

“Hello Derek, are those stacks for me?”

“What is it, Charlie?”

She closed the door and he felt a ripple of magic across the room.

“There’s an Asar and Adi Rasun in the meeting room.”

Derek’s eyes narrowed, “Where’s Stiles?”

“Speaking with them, right now. Running interference.”

“What do they want?”

“Anai. They say they’re here to take her home…”

Derek pulled Anai closer, the tiny form rumbled against him, nuzzling into the curve of his shoulder, her teething less furious and completely unaware of the implications of it all.

“She _is_ home.”

Charlie smiled, “We won’t give her up without a fight.”

Derek huffed and stood, kissing Anai’s temple before giving her to Charlie.

“Don’t let her out of your sight.”

She nodded. While she doubted that the two almost regal Lycan in the general meeting room meant to do a smash and grab for Anai, but there was no point in testing the theory. She took a seat in a chair in front of his desk and breathed, smoothing Anai’s curls down and rocking her gently, the way she would rock Derek, Laura, Cora, and Anthony when they were children. She wasn’t as powerful as Lenara, but she’d been there when the offices were built and when Claudia warded them all against unwanted entry and action.

“You’re safe little one,” she promised. “You’re safe.”

*

Stiles knew a bullshit story when he heard one, even without his magic. Asar and Adi had a bullshit story, a good one, but a bullshit story nonetheless. They were the kind of people who were willing to do anything to keep their family secretes secret. From the quality of their wolves and their features, they were definitely from North Africa, he’d bank on Egypt. They carried the air of that sort of Lycan: arrogant, traditional, conservative, _bigoted_.

From what he’d gathered from their conversation, they were siblings to the father of Anai, they hadn’t agreed with their brother’s choice of lover and they were here on behalf of their own pride and the Council. What they said was that Hotep Rasun, Anai’s father, had been “seduced” by a Wiccan woman and killed by her as well. They made sure to give Stiles and Charlie a blatant look distrust to sell their point. He knows for certain that they won’t succeed in taking Anai and that it will probably end worse for them than they can imagine.

“It’s rare for Lycan to travel so far,” Derek began entering the room, managing to not look as agitated at the sight of them as Stiles was sure he was. “What brings you all the way to Beacon Hills?”

Stiles continues to smile as the siblings talk. Derek hears that they meant to be sincere, but he doesn’t feel it. He hears that they want to take Anai away from him and his wolf is already baring his teeth.

“You well know that a Lycan child won’t do well without other Lycan, especially no in an orphanage. When we saw the picture, we couldn’t believe that she was alive, let alone here. We would have never let her stay here if we’d known.”

Derek hears the blip in Adi’s heart, but he isn’t sure which part is a lie. Interesting, that she would lie to another Lycan—did she think he was stupid?

“I’m already in the process of adopting her formally.”

Their eyes narrow and Stiles feels the shift in the air.

“You, as a Lycan, can understand that we have a problem with that.”

“It’s unheard of. She isn’t of your line. What good would that do?”

Derek manages a look of calm, “She isn’t of yours either as you told The Lodge when they contacted the entire Rasun family about her.”

“They didn’t—”

Derek’s eyes flash, “Do not continue to lie to me.”

Asar placed a hand on Adi’s shoulder, “The Lycan Board will never let you keep her. Alpha or not, you don’t have a real pack, not to mention she is of our blood. She belongs with us.”

“Blood or not, you don’t intend to care for her,” Derek growled. “You left her. She’s not even two years old, her parents are gone, and you _left_ her here. You think taking her away from Beacon Hills, just as pack bonds are forming will be good for her?”

“I wouldn’t expect a _Ravi luca-is_ to understand.”1

Stiles watched Derek’s teeth get longer; his eyes flash and knew that it would be more than just a growl about to happen. For them to say that meant they were gunning for a fight which was just what they didn’t need right now.

“Egypt,” he said drawing their attention. “Cairo to be specific is a Council territory, isn’t it? A first class?”

They looked at Stiles with a glare, “Devil consorts should stay out of matters that don’t concern them.”

Stiles’s eyes narrowed and he felt his magic roiling, “She is half-Wiccan. And you aren’t the first pair to try and claim her.”

That shocked Derek back to human form, glowing red eyes looking at Stiles. There was a tension in him as if he was prepared to leap forward and claw their faces off too. Seemed like he wasn’t the only one getting pissed off about the whole thing.

“Vice Emissary of Alexandria, Nadia Andari called,” the pair growled, their eyes flashing. Whether it was about the woman personally or the last name, he wasn’t sure, but it was telling. This wasn’t just a thing of pride but of territory and familial disputes.

Dear Goddess, they did not need another Wiccan-Lycan on their hands.

“She’ll be coming to visit in a few weeks’ time to meet her, looks like they’ve got the jump on you.”

Adi stood growling but Stiles continued, “What did the Council promise you? Alpha status? Money?”

“Silence.”

Stiles stood up, his eyes dark and glaring, “Or rather… _how much would she be worth on the black market?_ ”

Asar growled, eyes flashing gold and letting his claws slide out, “I will rend your head from your body, _witch_.”

Derek stood but Stiles held up a hand, “Leave, before you get hurt.”

Asar stands and slams a piece of paper on the table before turning to leave.

“This isn’t over,” Adi says as they exit and their security force guides them back to the portal.

Derek gets up and growls, prowling around the table angry and agitated as Stiles picks up the page.

“They would sell her? Of their own line? For their pride?”

Stiles hears the outrage, but he’s focused on the Lycan Board Subpoena they’ve been delivered for the hearing in two weeks. A fucking custody case in the middle of their barrier crisis was just the sort of thing to get under Derek’s skin, to make him unfocused, sloppy and maybe do something that could be used to justify his removal. They were planning something huge it felt like.

He frowned, what happened to Cora the night of the fire? Everyone else had been accounted for except for Cora…

“They can’t take her!” Derek growled.

“Easy big guy,” Stiles said. “Deep breath. I need you calm.”

Derek was still fuming but his claws retracted and he began to shift back to his human form rather than going into beta. His eyes were still glowing scarlet, but he breathed slowly.

“They’re right,” Stiles said. “If the Lycan board is going to get involved, they’ll never approve of you keeping her.”

“Who gives a fuck about them agreeing?” Derek growled. “They can’t have her.”

Stiles smiled at him and placed a hand on his shoulder, “Chill, big guy. I’m just saying we’ll have to get creative. Anai’s not going anywhere. I promise.”

“We don’t have time for this,” Derek growled.

Stiles nodded. It was a ploy to waste time and mental resources. To distract Derek from the barrier, from the increasing instability that was brewing in the territory… A ploy for many things including whatever their larger strategy was. He had a good idea that it involved the real beacon of Beacon Hills, whatever it was and the organization of large forces he’d been getting whispers about.

“You trust me as far as you can throw me?”

Derek nodded “Then go bond with Anai and I’ll catch up with you after my meetings, alright? Leave the office and go do Lycan things together.”

Derek nodded, making himself relax to collect Anai from Charlie’s arms. She was fully awake now, alert and still teething on the ring. Charlie left them alone before Derek went to the refrigerator beneath his desk and pulled out the cooled ring. At first bite, she sighed content and relaxed in his arms.

“How about a picnic, munchkin?”

She nodded and continued to teethe as he shut down his computer, packed a bag of snacks and went to the Camaro. Her eyes were still glowing brightly from the back seat and he smiled as he drove towards the Hale House. He carried her indoors to make a lunch they could pack in a bag before changing her into tiny running shoes and carrying her outside. She wasn’t coordinated enough to do much more than stumble and hold on to his hand for stability, but that was enough. She squealed as he lifted her over logs and they walked through the forest, soothed by the scent of the forest around them and the distance they were putting between themselves and the Hale House.

*

Stiles went to the meeting with the researchers and listened patiently to what they’d found out about the barrier. The energy signatures that they’d collected from the Nemeton, the memorial grave, and City Hall suggested that they were all anchors for the barrier because of the steadiness of the energy, but there was no tether to the barrier as far as they could tell.

“Like the barrier isn’t really connected to its anchors… I’ve never seen anything like it…”

Red, Lenara’s niece, shook her head, “It’s truly a new class of barrier.”

From the reports they had, Stiles could tell that the energy of the Beacon Hills barrier wasn’t necessarily something that would be figured out easily. More importantly, the very set up of the barrier made it difficult. Most barriers that performed the sort of repulsion the Beacon Hills Barrier was capable of was usually a consistent geometric shape: an oval, a circle, a square, etc, but the Beacon Hills Barrier behaved like a marking barrier in that it was organic in its shape, as if it only followed the edges of the territory.

“Let’s not even talk about it going over water!”

Red’s assistant slid the documentation towards him and let Stiles skim over the readings of the barrier over water. It was consistent. They were working on trying to get to the ocean floor to figure out if the barrier extended all the way down, but they had a good feeling it did.  They did have a chance to see it in action as a group of bandits had been around to raid Helion and wound up swimming straight into the barrier per the reports of the mermaid who spoke with them about the barrier.

They were arranging a dive next week.

Per their reports, the barrier was stable, even in water, it didn’t seem to be affected by the coming and going of the tide and was continuous from the shore and through the water. When the hour was up, Stiles had yet another stack of information on the barrier to go through and that much less time. The researchers would be returning to their universities the two weeks and it felt as though they were no closer to figuring out the barrier.

He breathed deeply and reminded himself to have patience. The researchers were all graduate students, trained by the council on certain kinds of barriers; they were trained to follow a procedure to trust their equipment and everything that was known to work. They had no experience with winging it…

As Derek said, running around naked was a practice special to Beacon Hills.

He collected the pages and all of the readings before heading back to the office for the rest of the research he’d gotten from the researchers. He grabbed whatever books he’d been working through in his makeshift office before carting it all towards his Jeep and loading it up. It would be a long night of reading even without the issue of the emissary children and the custody issues that had just popped up.

His phone rang and he prayed, against all hope, that it was good news. That maybe the emissaries that would be coming would be under ten.

Nope, there were nineteen kids and only three were from the same territory and the same school, but they were all of a myriad of species. A Siren, another werewolf, a human, three vampyr, a were-dragon, a Lycan from Spain…

He winced at that and closed the email; he’d have to look at it later, when he was breaking from the barrier madness. Instead, he drove the jeep to the Hale House. Derek opened the door for him with Anai in his arms.

She beamed at him and reached for Stiles, “Stiles!”

He grinned taking her and stepping into the house, bouncing her gently, “It’s good to see you awake, muchkin. How are you feeling?”

“Good, Alpha gave me magic stuff for the itchy.”

He grinned at her; she was just too cute to stand it. He glanced at the stack of books on the living room table, open and the pages of notes. It was all on barriers, research papers from across the territories, magic circles and the like.

“Seems like Alpha is busy,” Stiles said.

She nodded excitedly, “We’ve been reading about shields!”

He nodded and kissed her temple, “Oh yeah, tell me about them? I could learn somethings about shields.”

Derek listened from the kitchen, making food for them and the pack as Anai pointed to pictures and talked all about what she’d learned with Derek about shields. When she began to show him magic circles, he decided it was time for some hands on learning. He settled her in his lap and opened the book.

“This book is actually a wiccan book,” he explained turning the page to a repulsion barrier circle. “Place your hands above the circle and repeat after me.”

She lifted her hands and waited with curiosity.

“ _Wihaga arise_.”2

She repeated the words and squealed as the circle began to light up, filled with magic from the center to the edges and rose to create a dome over the circle.

“Congratulations munchkin, you’ve erected your first shield.”

She bounced happily staring at the tiny dome in wonder as Derek came around the corner to see the work. He grinned at her, ruffled her hair and lifted her into the air.

“What am I going to do? I’ve got such a powerful wiccan in my hands. A superhero in disguise.”

“I’m not that powerful,” she said bashfully, giggling as he kissed her cheek.

“You give her a cloak of course,” Stiles said fumbling his hands and producing a tiny scarlet cloak. Her eyes widened at it.

It was a very high fashion cloak with spider web, pentagram and full moon buttons at the shoulder and the Beacon Hills sigil on the back.

“You can’t be a superhero without a cape, and every proper Wiccan needs a cloak.”

Derek only smiled at how excited she was as Stiles put it on her and knocks sounded on the door. She clung to Derek’s shoulders as he told them to come in.

“Derek? Stiles?”

“In the dining room, you’re just in time for dinner.”

“Great, I’m starving!” Erica announced and came around the corner, frozen at the sight of the tiny, cloaked form clinging to Derek’s shoulders. Then the rest of the pack followed and stared as Stiles moved the tiny barrier she’d created on top of the stack of books.

“Anai, this is the Pack,” Derek stared rumbling at her and rubbing her back. “No need to be afraid.”

Scott’s eyes widened perceptively and he began to glow. Derek knew that it was only a matter of time before he exploded, so he stepped closer to the pack, close enough that she could smell them and relaxed.

“They smell like the big wolf,” she said in a small voice.

He nodded, “That’s because they spend a lot of time in him and with me.”

Anai nodded slowly and looked back at the pack. It was Erica who grinned at her and introduced herself, taking her from Derek’s arms with a warm hug.

“I love your cloak, Anai,” Lydia said, nuzzling her gently. “It’s wonderful to see you again.”

Not to Derek’s surprise, it was a very Lycan exchange in which they all smeared their scent over her, marking her as pack, as belonging, as one of their own. When she made it to Scott, he cracked.

“You’re the most adorable little baby I’ve ever seen! I’m going to spoil you rotten!”

She giggled accepting the enthusiastic hug and nuzzling from the pixie, laughing as pixie dust scattered and turned whatever lingering seeds or plant pieces in her hair in to vines and flowers curling through her hair and blossoming in the curls. He was even less surprised that they matched the scarlet cloak.

“It’s dinner time,” Derek said ushering them to the living room. They carried everything out to the coffee table in the middle and sat around it. As he expected, Anai was an instant favorite among them. They ate together, talked about all the time she’d been spending with Derek, what she’d been doing all day. They played games with her as Stiles and Derek stepped away from the conversation both were dreading.

“They’ll keep her busy,” Derek said closing the porch door behind them. “No need to worry.”

“Are you saying that for yourself or for me?”

He snorted, “Smart ass.”

Derek leaned against the banister with a deep sigh, “Tell me.”

Stiles nodded, “It’s more than likely to distract you from the barrier, to make you unsettled, unstable in the hopes that you’ll do something that will make removing you feasible. They’re playing a dangerous game.”

He huffed, “Of course. What’s your take on Nadia?”

Stiles snorted, “She wants to turn her into a magic experiment.”

Derek frowned looking at her, “Lycans would sell her to the Council or even the handiest poacher to spite her father. A Wiccan would keep her for observation and testing. It’s very rare that a Wiccan-Lycan child retains both sides. Examining her would give them insights to make more in the case of another war.”

He huffed, that was the last thing they needed, “How likely is that to happen?”

“Between Cairo and Alexandria? Very likely.”

They’d been fighting since the times of Alexander the Great even when he took over both territories.

“So this is more a territory and racial dispute than any question of Anai’s well-being.”

Stiles nodded, “Her parents knew that. It was probably why they sent her here.”

He frowned, “What do you mean?”

Stiles spoke with Lilith about Anai arriving at The Lodge not too long ago. She’d appeared in the middle of a transportation circle, untraceable, unmarked with a message wrapped around her containing the child’s name and a plea to keep her safe inscribed in the circle itself.

“It said to take Anai _where shields are raised, together in front and back, on all sides_.”

Derek frowned, “Is there some significance in that?”

“It’s taken from an old Druid play. It’s not very well known as the entire thing was never transcribed, but the speech of one of the characters was transcribed a few times over. It’s the most cited piece of the play.”

“How’d you know she was half-Wiccan?” Derek asked.

Stiles laughed, “MDI lets me peek at people’s ley lines. Hers are a mash up Lycan and Wiccan… a perfect mash-up at that.”

When he’d taken a good look at her, it hadn’t been hard to figure out. The fact that she can use Wiccan incantations was just icing on the cake. She’d always be wanted, but her being in Beacon Hills meant that she was more than well protected.

Derek nodded, “I guess that makes her really valuable then.”

Stiles nodded, “To both sides, luckily Lycans, on the whole, believe that their sheer force is good enough to overcome anything… So long as they keep to that way of thinking we’ll have less to worry about.”

Derek shook his head, “The Lycan Board isn’t very happy with the Hale Family in general.”

“That’s because your family is so _pure_ and doesn’t give a shit. They have a history of doing what they want, when they want.”

Derek nodded. It was true. Hell, his great grandfather was somewhere in the world running feral, probably scaring the shit out of people as an exceptionally large black wolf. He’d nearly lost everything in the Lycan-Wiccan War and it had driven him into the sort of melancholy that could break people. He’d only seen his great grandfather in human form once when he was a child. He’d shifted just after Derek first shifted to pick him up, nuzzle him with the sort of warmth that meant hope.

There was another black wolf in the family… that looked just like him in mortal form. His grandfather had forgone becoming leader of the territory he was born in to become leader of a Hostiles territory through his own means…. In the same fashion, Talia had crossed the country to start Beacon Hills. The Hale family, while well respected by the Lycan community and the Lycan Board, did not respect the customs of the Lycan Board. It had, after all, been their fault that the Hale Pack had suffered so much damage in the Lycan-Wiccan war.

Derek snorted and rubbed his face with a shake of his head, “Yes… we have quite the reputation.”

Stiles nodded, “Given that she is verifiably a mixed child, they’ll have to involve the Wiccan Elders.”

“Do they know that?”

“No, but I sent a response on your behalf and of course one to the Wiccan board with a bit of help.”

Derek rose an eyebrow at the grin on his face, “Don’t worry, Derek. I’ve got connections.”

Derek winced at the thought of Stiles’s connections but couldn’t say much more about it. They headed back in to see most of the pack asleep. Anai cuddled up with Isaac, her cloak hung up and beneath a blanket that Derek often covered up with when he needed the comfort. It had been passed down through the Hale family for centuries, everyone he’d ever known in the Hale family had slept under that blanket and it was warm enough to suggest that there was just a little bit of magic in it.

“Adorable,” Stiles said with a grin.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) Pack-ender lit. Pack End Maker, a Lycan slang term for people who kill family or pack members. Very mean to say.  
> 2) War-shield Rise.


	15. The Superhero and the Dragon Tamer

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adorableness, Dragons on the East border, custody hearings, a title returns to the family, words from beyond the grave, insights on the barrier, and the emissaries in training arrive. The past fucking suck, Lycan hierarchy sucks ass (part 1) and domestic feels.
> 
> P.S. Stiles is a fucking badass
> 
> P.P.S Happy New Year

In the days after, Anai found herself accompanying members of the pack on random excursions around town. The first day was with Lydia to speak with the press and the other people who Derek needed someone with good P.R. skills to work with. Lydia got the job simply because her mother was a business consultant and she had a lot of practice dealing with troubling people.

Lydia arrived at the Hale House to pick up Anai bringing a brand new outfit and a pair of shades to match the rest of the pack. Derek knew Lydia would be trouble as soon as she came in with bags of clothing.

The dress was sleeveless and a bright white and yellow pattern along with a matching sweater. Derek was sure that Anai would be out of it within the hour given that her temperature was rising to Lycan levels. There was a huge bow tied in her hair and a tiny backpack that was just short of matching Lydia’s.

“Have fun, oh adorable one,” Derek told Anai, kissing her cheek.

Lydia only beamed at him, took Anai’s hand and lead her towards the car with a backpack full of snacks. Derek only smiled at the fact that Lydia bought another car seat, specifically for her car, and strapped Anai in before driving off for the day. When Lydia and Anai came back, the little girl was contentedly exhausted and dozing off on Lydia’s shoulder.

Jackson’s day went about the same way. Lydia’s shades and whatever clothing he’d come with to dress her in for the day. Isaac, Kira, Allison, Erica, and Boyd seemed have been on the same page, coming with clothes that Lydia gave them and a full agenda.

Scott’s day… may have been a little more excitement than anyone planned. He was in charge of a pixie event: tending a section of the forest that had become under duress during a recent exorcism. The gate to hell had been closed, but the field hadn’t sprung back. Anai had been absolutely delighted at the prospect of throwing around handfuls of shiny dust that made things grow and Scott had been more than happy to explain pixie mechanics and dust.

“Pixies create pixie dust natural—”

A child screamed and Scott turned to see them running towards him from the edge of the field, a great figure lumbering through the forest with glowing yellow eyes towering over them.

_Dragon._

Scott lifted Anai into his arms and ordered all the kids back on the bus, before handing Anai off to the nearest adult. He was the only pixie in the field, but with the concentration of dust, splattered all over the kids, the dragon wouldn’t know the difference.

There was one kid left in the field running, but the dragon seemed content to toy with her as she screamed and ran towards Scott. Scott gathered a ball of black dust and ran towards her, throwing it in the dragon’s face before grabbing the child and turning around to run.

“Someone call the Pack! Dragon on the east border!” Scott yelled, giving the sobbing child to the woman standing in the door of the bus, before climbing on top of the bus and latching himself to the top of the bus.

“Get us back to town! Move it!”

Tires screeched and he could hear the children’s panic. He grew vines over the windows, flowers in through the window to calm them and give him some more stability as more dragons began to appear…. Three at least.

_Fuck…_

Erica got the call while on her way to drop Boyd off at the temple in the next city. They weren’t too far from the East Border, but even if they came, they could maybe buy some time. Dragons were a pain in the ass to get to go away… And notoriously hard to kill. The last person to kill a dragon had been Claudia Heironim in the last siege, right before the barrier went up. People still weren’t sure how she, Talia, and the originals of Beacon Hills did it.

“Call Kira,” Erica said, tapping the phone to get a hold of Derek.

Derek had been on the way to Lenara’s house for an update on the Druids in the area when he’d gotten the call and turned the car around, wheels screeching against the ground to throw it into full drive towards East territory, praying that he’d get there in time to be of some use to them.

Anai screamed and fumbled as the bus bounced and stuttered across the ground. The dragons throwing fire and lighting at them to stop the bus. Scott weaved bigger and bigger nets of flame retardant vines around the bus, but could do nothing for the impact.

She heard the roar of a car coming towards them and Erica standing up through the top of the car, conjuring ball of fire in her hands. Scott’s jaw dropped.

“When the hell could you do that?” Scott yelled.

“I’ve been practicing!” She threw it forward, nailing the closest dragon in between the eyes just as the car swerved around a lightning bolt. “Keep it steady, babe. I’m not that great of a shot.”

“Did you call Derek?!” Scott yelled.

“Yeah, he’s on his way too. How far are we to the nearest city?!”

“Too far!”

Boyd made a sound of agreement before letting the future unfold before him. The lightning would strike left, then right, fire to the right of the bus. The bus would swerve. Scott watched the leading dragon fall back in line with the other three that had come. No doubt there would be more.

Anai scrambled for the phone in her bag and hit 2.

Stiles had been in the middle of talking with Raava when his phone rang, he answered it, “Anai? What’s wrong?”

“There are these big things chasing us in the bus! With wings! Scott’s on top of the bus, but we’re too far from the nearest city.”

Stiles stood from his chair, “Stay on the line, Anai. Raava, I could probably use your help.”

She nodded, floating, Stiles left cash on the table for their meal and they took off into the sky heading towards the East.

“We won’t make it,” Raava said over the wind. Stiles reached out for her shoulder and drew a circle through the air.

It expanded and engulfed them until they could hear dragon’s screeching. Raava’s jaw dropped, but she flew forward to head up the attack. It was much closer than they were before but not close enough to stop the blast of lightning. The bus skidded, tire busted and Erica’s car stopped. Erica and Boyd got out as Scott rolled off the top of the bus. It didn’t tip over, but it surely wasn’t going to move any farther.

“Any thoughts?!” Erica asked as the dragons circled above them.

Scott’s eyes grew bright, pushing the last of his power to make a barrier around them. It wouldn’t last long, but it was better than nothing.

“Anai,” Stiles said calmly. “I need you to close your eyes and listen to me.”

She shook and closed her eyes.

“You’re a superhero, you know that?”

“But I don’t have my cape.”

“Even when in disguise, superheroes save the day, sweet. I need you close your eyes and imagine the circle in the book. The shield you raised.”

She tried, but the image wouldn’t hold. It shifted and stuttered. Everything was too loud.

“Concentrate, love, just calm down and listen to me. Your alpha is on the way, I’m on the way, there’s no need to be scared. You can be a big girl for me, a superhero, and protect everyone who’s scared in the bus, can’t you?”

“Yes…”

“I know you can, you’ve got the image in your mind?”

It steadied as she took deeper breaths, “Yes.”

A large circle with letters inscribed and a star… yes, she remembered it.

“Good, remember the tingling we talked about? I need you to feel it now and pull it to your hands.”

She tried, but it was slow going, through her arms, stuttering, “Slowly. I promise it’s alright. Tell me when you’ve got it.”

“I-I’ve got it…”

“Good, repeat after me, okay?”

She breathed and listened to the words he was saying, “ic am randwiga ond heretoga, swa cweÞan swa bebiode freondum, ofer dracan w _ihaga arise_.” 1

The tingling grew and Scott continued to push power into the vines to grow as fast as they were burnt away, yet it did nothing and the fire began to burn through, the temperature grew hotter and the glow of pixie dust began to dim.

“I can’t… any longer…” Scott groaned, falling to his knees, his stomach cramping with hunger and his body refusing to do much more. The vines fell away, crumbling to ash above them and Erica aimed another blast only to find that the dragon’s claws were repelled a brilliant blue ripple through the air.

A barrier.

What?

Erica turned towards the car to hear the tiny voice still speaking, “Ofer daracan, ic onsacan. æladum ond stym getrymman min scildum swa minre freond gewunige heore oð  sige sprecan.” 2

Another burst of flame ushered forth turned the rippling blue light brighter and expanding it farther.

“Holy shit,” Erica said.

Stiles grinned seeing the change as Raava did battle with one of the dragons who’d fallen back. Stiles landed on top of the shield and held out his hands to catch the burst of fire in his hands. He felt it rushing into him, his ley lines drinking it in and storing more for later, rage and hunger—destruction. His eyes lit up, glowing yellow until the assault stopped and the dragon stared at him, their eyes met.

Scott looked up as Stiles let out a roar and screech. The dragons screeched back before Stiles began to float and whatever magic he’d absorbed began to float around him threatening an attack. There was a howling before Derek’s car skidded to a stop and the Lycan came around the bus to growl at the dragons himself, and dark, ghoulish body leapt through the air and sunk its teeth into a dragon’s neck.  Its scales turned black, then ashen grey until it fell from the sky and the body continued to eat.

Stiles let out another screech before the dragons returned to the sky. Stiles lifted an arm and the dark, ghoulish form took off into the sky after the dragons.  He drifted to the ground and turned towards the pale blue bubble before pressing a hand to it.

“Sige,” he said and the bubble fizzled out, allowing him to walk towards Scott on the ground and hand him a package of Double Stuffed Oreos before opening the bus door. Derek just behind him.3

The kids were oddly calm, the light scent of pixie powered lavender in the air. Anai clutched the phone in her hand, her tiny backpack and shook as Stiles came towards her.

“Super hero,” he said gently, gathering her into his arms. “You were so amazing, Anai. Maybe we should get you a cape to wear all the time.”

She shook, adrenaline high in his arms, but said nothing, curling up against him.

“You were so brave,” he soothed. “So very brave.”

It wasn’t until she got into Derek’s arms that she started crying. Stiles rubbed her back and told everyone else to get off the bus. Erica, Boyd, and Scott remained outside, trying to get Scott onto his feet without falling over.

“Look at the pixie,” Erica grinned. “Fighting a dragon!”

He chuckled nervously and went slightly pale. Derek pat him on the shoulder, “You did well, Scott. I’m proud of you.”

He flushed at the compliment, “What just happened?”

Stiles grinned and stepped aside to gesture to Anai, “A superhero saved the day.”

They looked to Anai who clung to Derek as he rumbled at her and told her how proud he was, that she was safe, and thanked her for being so brave. The remaining kids thanked her, cheered for her and in just a few moments proclaimed her the coolest person ever. The jeep came trucking down the road along with the local police with a new bus, a tow truck, and medical supplies.

Luckily, there were only a few scrapes and bruises to the kids. When they got back to the school, parents rushed to grab their kids, to look them over and to thank the Pack. Stiles conjured a cloak to keep Anai warm against the drop in adrenaline. She’d be asleep within the hour, but better to keep her warm now.

“Don’t thank us, thank the little girl in the scarlet cloak.”

They did, she shied away from the attention, clinging to Derek, but told them that they were welcome. Stiles told Scott to get into the jeep, call Kira, and eat. Derek got in as well, leaving Erica to drive the Camaro back to Beacon Hills City while Raava and Stiles went to go investigate the hole large enough to let four adult dragons through. Finding it, surprisingly, wasn’t hard as the hellhound stood guard at it.

Raava remained far away from it as Stiles surveyed the hole. No doubt that there was more than just dragons in the territory now, from the looks of it, something had been eating the barrier for a while now.

“Not good,” Raava said as Stiles moved forward to speak soft words over the hole and weave a magic net over it, threading it into the barrier and sealing the hole from getting any larger.

“It isn’t perfect but it will do until we can figure it out,” he said and floated towards Raava before petting the hellhound. “Could you get with Nartra and do a survey of the East side, see if anything else untoward has been going on. Maybe any dragons around? I’m going to set this guy on patrol.”

Her eyes widened, “Patrol?  A hellhound?”

He nodded, “There’s a hell gate here. It’s not as big as the one in Greece, but there is one here… and a heaven’s bridge point too…. The things you learn about Beacon Hills.”

Raava winced as Stiles pet the hound, “Don’t worry, he’s not a threat to anyone loyal to Beacon Hills.”

Raava nodded, but was wary. In the dragon wars, hellhounds had been chief assassins of the black scaled clans. They were deadly to any living thing once their teeth sunk in, but for dragons they posed a very particular threat: they could fly as high as dragons and for far longer. There was no escaping them and dragons could not perform exorcisms unless they were black dragons.

When Stiles returned to Beacon Hills City, Derek and Anai were finishing lunch and heading towards City Hall. Stiles had a surprise planned for her so she wouldn’t have to be away from Derek so often and be somewhere calming.

Derek didn’t know anything about it, but upon seeing the tiny replica of his desk, he was all for it. After the dragon scare, he’d be very happy not to let her out of his sight a for a while. Anai loved it, taking her duties very seriously. A cup holder filled with age appropriate crayons of every possible color and a stack of pages to be rejected.

“Think you can handle being the official Rejecter?”

She nodded excitedly and set to work on her first masterpiece on a notice from the Council regarding making them a second-class territory: they wanted access to Beacon Hill’s finances. Stiles looked at Derek who watched Anai with a misty look in his eye. It was probably a blast from the past, making him feel as though he was taking part of a long standing tradition…

“You alright big guy?” Stiles asked watching him.

Derek nodded, “Yeah… it’s just hard to see my old position being filled.”

Stiles snorted, “She’ll be just fine.”

And she was, she left with Derek and came in with him for the next three days until the anxiety in both of them had eased. With that and the normal flow of pack business, no one had begun to ask him about the interaction with the dragon and he rather preferred it that way. On the fourth day, Stiles came to the Hale House to pick Anai up.

Derek was wearing his standard Henley (forest green today), jeans, leather jacket, and boots combination and oh did Stiles have a surprise for him!

“Lydia sent you with clothes?” Derek asked.

Stiles shook his head, “Don’t be silly, I brought her my own version of a uniform.”

Derek snorted and wasn’t sure if he was prepared for it…

No… He really wasn’t prepared at all. Where the hell did Stiles find a Henley that small? It was like looking into a minimizing mirror or something. Her Henley was the same shade of green as his, a perfect replica down to the buttons. She wore a ruffled jean skirt, the same sort of jeans as the pair he wore, and tiny boots that matched his. Her shades were aviators and to make matters worse the back of the Henley said “Undercover Superhero”.

“Stiles, what…”

“It gets better!” Stiles said offering the bag he’d brought with him to Anai. She squealed and pulled out a miniature leather jacket, yet another tiny replica of his and put it on before running to Derek.

“We match!”

He picked her up with a laugh to look at the full ensemble, but of course, Stiles wasn’t done, because the bow he’d fashioned in her hair said “My Dad’s Cooler Than You”. He was sure that pictures of her would end up on the territory website during whatever Stiles was taking her to do in the city.

He didn’t even make it to City Hall when his phone chimed with a picture. She was in her shades, grinning a wolfy grin at the camera in a miniature Camaro. Where Stiles managed to find a miniature Camaro, he didn’t want to know, but the texts came pouring in from the central and extended pack about the “Mini-Alpha” riding around with Stiles taking care of business and getting things set up for the incoming emissaries in training and more barrier research. They came to City Hall and she parked the tiny Camaro next to Derek’s before coming with Stiles inside.

Seeing her so happy somehow managed to make him relax enough that Nadia’s visit didn’t irk him as much as it should have. For one, she was much better at hiding her ulterior motives for wanted Anai. She assured them both that she would be present for the hearing in a few days and left without fuss even though she didn’t get to meet Anai.

“Sneaky,” Derek said watching her hop on to her scythe and float back towards the transport portal. “Very.”

“Not sneaky enough,” Stiles said with a grin.

Derek left Anai with Erica, Scott and Stiles the day of the trial, exchanging a long hug at the transport gate.

“Be good,” he rumbled. “I’ll be back soon.”

“Okay,” she said and let him set her down. Stiles handed over a stack of pages.

“Your contacts will meet you at the gate.”

Derek nodded, “Stiles… I…”

He grinned, “You trust me?”

He nodded and turned, stepping through the portal and hoping for the best.

He was not expecting one Marcelina Heironim and Hedwig Bluewater to meet him on the other side. Marcelina, mother of Claudia Heironim, looked just as old as the last time she’d come to visit Beacon Hills. Hedwig Bluewater was the elvish leader of a territory in what used to be Saudia Arabia. He guessed that her territory had been the one Anai’s parents ran to and hoped they could live in peace.

“Hello Derek,” Marcelina greeted.

The coolness of Northern Ireland was an odd change from the easy seasons of California, but neither woman seemed to mind. They guided him towards a carriage and climbed in with him before asking to look at the paperwork Stiles sent with him.

“The child is very thorough,” Hedwig said with a nod. “Good, this should be quick then.”

She began to confirm his suspicion about her relation to Anai. No doubt Anai did not remember the woman, but her parents had come seeking sanctuary. Hedwig promised to guard them for as long as she was able, but eventually offered up Beacon Hills.

“There are people who have heard of Beacon Hills, but do not believe that it exists. A territory with such order and stability outside of the Council’s rule is practically myth now.”

Derek nodded; he knew that much from his talks with Stiles. Lycan rules dictated that a child, when they lost their parents, fell under the direct jurisdiction of the territory their parents were a part of. While Hedwig’s territory was small and out of the Council’s rule, it was still a territory and her parents had been there for a full year before they were murdered, making Anai a little over a year old.

Marcelina was there purely for the Wiccan rules. In the case of a mixed child, both species had a say in what was best, but as Marcelina held such clout throughout the world, her presence alone would be seen as favorable. Alexandria was engaged in a war with Cairo, Marcelina would be a stable Wiccan presence in Anai’s life even if she had no intention of taking her to Poland. The plan was simple it seemed and when they arrived at the court of the Lycan board, he could see that Stiles had planned extraordinarily well for it.

The stipulation of course was that if Anai shifted, they would reconvene, otherwise it would be completely Wiccan case and Anai would be allowed to stay in Beacon Hills with Derek. If she shifted, talks would continue. As Derek saw it, he had another three to seven years to plan, to make his case stronger for both sides beyond the obvious unbiased motivations of the two families from which she descended.

“Thank you,” Derek told them both. Marcelina and Hedwig only smiled.

“There is no need to thank us. Friends lend aid when able and I see a time when we will need your help.”

“Anything,” he promised with a smile, shaking their hands. “Anything at all.”

When he returned, he posted the ruling on the corkboard in his office and took a deep breath.

 _Poker face and a steady heart,_ he reminded himself.

*

“Hottest Alpha of the Year Title Returns to the Hale Family!” Erica cheered coming through the door to Derek’s office carrying the announcement on her phone.

Derek grumbled; Stiles had been kind enough to provide a briefing and the fact that reporters from The Lycan Informer would be coming to take official pictures of him and of course write an article on him.

“Publicity,” Stiles reminded him. “It’s important that people know about Beacon Hills actually here, alive and in one piece.”

He grumbled still. The Lycan Informer, World News from Florence, the Council, it seemed as though everyone wanted to talk to him.

“One more thing,” Erica said, taking the seat after ruffling Anai’s hair at her tiny desk.

“Yes Erica?”

“Three new holes have appeared. They’re tiny, but they’re there.”

He groaned, “Have you told Stiles?”

She nodded. Stiles had gone to check it out right after she’d told him and with that Derek sighed sitting back, “That makes five in just this week.”

Stiles knocked on the door carrying a notebook in his hand and looking as though he hadn’t slept the night before.

“Hey Erica,” he greeted and ruffled Anai’s hair. “Hello Wonder Girl, how are you today?”

“I’m okay. Oh, I got a tooth!”

She opened her mouth to show him and, in truth, there was one brilliantly white tooth there, the beginnings of two more beside it.

“That’s awesome! Having teeth is the best. You’re coming up in the world.”

She beamed at him and carried on with her drawing over the fifth request from the Council to gain access to Beacon Hills’s finances.

“Tell me that no one else wants to talk with me?”

Stiles shook his head, “No one else that I know of. I promise. I just came to see if you needed anything from me before I head out for a day of research. I’m meeting with the team before they leave and then heading to casa de Stilinski.”

“For sleep, I hope, Batman,” Erica said looking at him.

“A nap, then back to research.”

“You need rest, who knows when we’ll have another dragon incident. We’ll need you to send them away.”

Derek looked at him, “And how exactly did you do that? I’ve been meaning to ask.”

“MDI and a lot of Hostiles living,” Stiles said with a shrug. “Head’s up, I will be gone for the first four days of the emissary homestay. Out of territory research.”

Derek groaned, “What are we supposed to do with them?”

Stiles laughed, “Day 1: they’ll be exhausted from the time difference. Day 2: give them a tour of Beacon Hills City. Day 3: split them up among the Pack to tour the rest of the territory. Day 4: they’ll meet with Derek and go to Beacon Hills University where they will get a chance to sit in on some classes to supplement their training. I’ll be back around dinner time, so I’ll take over from there.”

Derek and Erica blinked, “It’s also on everyone’s calendar. I’ve informed everyone, it’s cool.”

Derek nodded and told him to get some sleep. Erica left, promising to come hang out with Anai later and the rest of the day stretched out before him filled with interviews.

Surprisingly, the interviews go well. They take pictures, stick to the questions they’ve been cleared to ask, and they’re on their way. The woman from the Lycan Informer gives him her personal number and tells him to call any time.  Anai helps Charlie during the interviews, scenting batches of pages, scanning things, and generally being “the best office assistant ever”.

Stiles sends off the researchers, thanks them for all of their help and prays that somewhere in their final reports is something he can use before going to the Stilinski house. Nikodem is in the kitchen eating, still in his uniform, no doubt going back on shift.

“Hey kiddo, you’re looking a little run down.”

Stiles nodded, “I am a bit. I’m going to eat, take a nap, and then get back to work on the barrier.”

Nikodem nodded, “Have you read your mother’s letter yet?”

Stiles swallowed thickly and shook his head.

“You should, probably need the morale booster.”

Stiles nodded, but was Stiles ready to read it? He wasn’t sure about that. While his bed was comfortable, it did nothing for his nightmares. Visions of blood, people dead, Scott being eaten alive, and him completely… useless.

 _I trusted you!_ Derek yelled at him and it was then that Stiles sat up.

He couldn’t have been asleep for more than an hour or so. His magic roiled beneath his skin and he swung his legs over the side of the bed to stand and go downstairs. Since he’d learned the barrier was a problem, he’d been taking tentative steps into Claudia’s office. The door to it was in the basement and it was generally a pocket of another dimension. He opened the door and felt the seal on the office scan him and grant him entry. When he’d first opened it, it had been just as she’d left it-- books open everywhere, floating around. Now, there was a current map of Beacon Hills floating around with it all, books, and pens taking notes and writing out magic equations while he was away.

He’d been working with a split consciousness for three days and it was beginning to take its toll on him, but none of the equations came to fruition, no combination of anything he’d learned from any of the books was working or could explain it at all and now he had piles of research to go through still.

The note caught his eye and he breathed slowly, what harm could it do to read it?

He lifted it up and opened it.

_Took you long enough._

_Left bottom drawer._

_Love, Mom._

He snorted and reached for the drawer, pulling it open to seen a small notebook, one that tugged on his memories gently, but insistently, as he opened it and watched the words appear on the first page.

_Joachim,_

_I’ll cut to the chase: they’re right. It was a last ditch effort, a half-formed plan, a desperate move because I didn’t have a choice. If you’re reading this, you’re probably old enough to understand why I did it… why it needed to be done and what you have to do now. You probably don’t remember this journal, but it was the inspiration to my work on the barrier, the inspiration that made the hack-job work until now._

_I’m leaving it to you to finish, between you and Derek I have no doubt that you can._

_Don’t hide from the light, Joachim. You and Derek were meant for great things. Unite beneath the beacon._

_When you’re ready, take your staff, don your cloak and be great._

_Love, Mom_

His throat felt tight, but he could see it at the bottom of the drawer--that blood red cloak that Claudia wore until the last. Unlike the standard emissary cloaks, this one followed no style code or aesthetic. The pin to hold it closed was a spider web, spun by arachni in the Beacon Hills Forest. Their webs solidified to something harder than stone and granted the wearer the kind of protection that made fighting dragons easy. The cloak was woven with magic: dragon blood given willingly, wiccan circles, lycan fur, pixie dust (so it always looked flawless), faerie light, and druid chants… there was darkness and light, history and future in this cloak and feeling it now, he felt her there, a hand on his shoulder, a whisper in his ear.

_Don your cloak and be great._

He opened the notebook expecting his mother’s neat handwriting… but found his own sprawling cursive instead. They were notes from his Elements of Magic Class… his first year of high school. He’d spent most of doodling and finishing mini assignments that Claudia had given him.

Those had been simpler times, days spent hypothesizing, writing, dreaming of what Beacon Hills could be… how much safer it would be with a barrier.

A true safe haven….

Stiles’s eyes widened looking at the map and then back to the page. He’d been the inspiration…

By Merlin, they hadn’t been working on it for centuries! Just a matter of a few years at best. He shook his head, mind-blown. Reverse engineering a barrier based on the idea of a kid, made real by the last Paladin in the world.

It was a bittersweet hope, but he nodded, placing the cloak on the top of the desk and standing to walk out of the office with the notebook in hand. Memories came back to him through the disruption in his head, the words of the speech hanging on the edge of his consciousness.

He went to Leanra’s House and asked for whatever manuscripts of the old play she had.

Lenara smiled, “On Claudia’s shelf.”

He frowned and smirked, at least he was heading the right direction. Wiccans and druids shared the fact that their words were their power for the most part, their thoughts and intentions fueled spells. No doubt the Beacon Hills barrier’s spell is based on the speech in some form. He called the library of Alexandria and asked for the oldest copy they had while heading back home. It would take a while to get but he had no doubt that it would be well-worth the wait. The Jeep met him in the driveway and he climbed in letting it drive him to City Hall while he flipped through the notebook. Days and weeks of combining magic circles, researching if it was possible, harmonizing energies...

He grinned at Charlie, said hi to Derek and Anai before heading to the conference room at the end of the hall. Standing in the middle of the maelstrom, he took a deep breath and summoned all of the materials he’d been using, and had last been used by Claudia, to the room. Commanded the books to separate by species and subject, his notes forming a floating circle in the middle, the map on the floor enlarged.

He took a seat, grabbing a pencil and a notebook before setting to work. He’d been thinking about it all wrong, unable to see the full board. He had to see it now, before it was too damn late.

*

Before anyone realized it, it was the week before the emissaries in training were set to arrive and Stiles had been running around the territory with a notebook in his hand at all hours of the night. Today, he was taking a break to meet with the core pack and the extended pack in the large meeting hall in City Hall to give them a briefing on the barrier complete with slideshows and the like.

“The largest holes are here and there are sentry stationed there. When you come into contact with them, don’t freak out. They mean no harm so long as you don’t attack them. They’re there to watch for and stop anything that could come through. Friendlies are marked with red sigils over their bodies, unfriendlies are unmarked.

The barrier is deteriorating faster by the day, if you find a hole, report it immediately. Lenara and Dasha will take care of it and we’ll add it to the map. Note that everyone has been given a new set of weapons, they’re for dragons specifically. They aren’t strong enough to kill, but they’ll hurt like hell and buy you time until someone can back you up. They’re magic so if you aren’t used to channeling magic they’ll drain you pretty quickly. I expect everyone to get trained up and practicing soon.

When the emissaries in training arrive at the portal, the core Pack will be picking them up in their time slots and they will be staying at the Azure. Arrangements have been made and in case I don’t make it back when I’m supposed to, Charlie has their training program for while they’re here. Feel free to take a look at it, but as I’ve already spoken with everyone, it shouldn’t be more than a refresher. Any questions?”

“When’s the last time you slept?” Nikodem asked.

Stiles grumbled at him as a ripple of snickers went through the room.

“I can sleep when there isn’t fire breathing down our necks.”

Nikodem laughed and shook his head. Merlin, he sounded like Claudia. With the meeting adjourned, Stiles bid everyone farewell, kissed Anai’s cheek, ruffled her hair and went running out through the main portal, flashing his consultant badge and passport at the guard.

Derek was only grateful that no holes seemed to be appearing near the portal. The havoc that could ensue if their enemies could waltz right into the heart of Beacon Hills was catastrophic. He offered up, yet another, thanks to Claudia, for the smaller barrier over the portal.

“So when things go wrong,” Scott started.

“I’m calling Stiles… and telling him to call Derek. God knows Derek won’t.”

Scott nodded in agreement. Though Stiles had stressed to Derek that he could call at any time, the other still hadn’t managed to. Erica had urged to Stiles to call often in case of an emergency. He promised to do so and to get back as soon as he could.

Allison, without a drop of supernatural blood in her veins knows that this was going to end badly.

*

Stiles planned well. Scott and Isaac were there to pick up Aurora and the five girls arriving within an hour of Aurora coming. In general, they were either Druid or Wiccan of well to do families. One Raven Pendragon had the air of someone who thought they were far more important than they actually were, hailing all the way from Camelot, Wales, she was something of interest. Blonde hair, highlighted with wiccan red and pendragon gold, clothes far too expensive for a territory stay and eyes as blue as the sky. She was pretty, but she didn’t wear it well. Isaac and Scott climbed into Scott’s car and the girls climbed into the Jeep.

“Her meeting Stiles is going to be interesting,” Isaac said from the passenger seat.

Scott nodded. Isaac probably meant from her general air, but Scott knew that the Pendragons and the Heironims had a long standing history of aggression. The Pendragons insisted that as descendants of Arthur Pendragon, they were the most important Wiccan family in the world. As the first King of Britain, and a Wiccan, they saw themselves as descendant of some sort of Wiccan royalty. As Arthur learned his gifts, and was created through magical means, they took him to be the archetype Wiccan. The Heironims, as descendants of Merlin, more often than not laughed in their faces.

Wicca, being an old term for sorcerer, literally meant “witch”. Witches around the time the term began to be used for the Pendragon versions of Wiccans, referred to someone who’d made a pact with spirits to have access to power. They were in short, human beings with magical affinity or in long term magical contracts. Heironims saw themselves as a different class of Wiccans all together as they were the only family whose “manifestation” happened before they had consciousness. Being born with the ability to manipulate magic from first breath, the same way that Merlin had been, made them something else.

Merlin was born of magic and a need in the mortal world. His magical abilities were cultivated over his entire lifespan, not merely a few years. Magic was a part of him that could not be removed.  The only true “wiccan” in the old story was Arthur as he did in fact make a pact with spirits for his power, which was in fact his undoing… a fact that the Pendragons didn’t like mentioned in polite company.

Yet everyone knew that the old man in the beanie at the Heironim family reunion was Merlin himself.

Jackson was there to pick up Rosalina Ochoa, hailing from Madrid, one of the only all Lycan territories in the world. She had all the features of a strong Spanish heritage: dark hair, dark eyes.  She looked over him and gave him a very formal greeting. He only ushered her into his car and welcomed her to Beacon Hills before driving her to the Azure and getting her settled in and handing her the package with her name on it.

Allison picked up Mikhaira who arrived via plane in Los Angeles and then portal jumped to Beacon Hills. Short, messy brown hair that had been windblown, bright brown eyes, wearing clothing too thick for the California weather. She squealed looking around at the magic circle on the ground, the sentry posted at the portal and seemed amazed at Beacon Hills in general.

“I’ve never portal jumped before! It was so cool and so much faster than flying! Hi! I’m Mikhaira, it’s nice to meet you!”

Allison only grinned at her and pulled her close, “You think portal jumping is cool, wait until we take you on a tour. I’m Allison, resident human of the Beacon Hills Pack. Hop on the bike and I’ll take you to where you’re staying.”

She looked at her suitcase wondering how it was going to fit before Allison lifted it and placed it beside the bike. A magic circle lit up and her bag vanished before Allison climbed on to her bike. Mikhaira climbed on behind her.

“Did you send it to another dimension?”

Allison snorted, “No, it’s just compressed.”

“Will my clothes get wrinkled?”

Allison laughed revving the engine so the wheel retracted and they hovered for a moment.

“They’ll probably come out neater than they went in.”

“Are we floating? How is it doing that?”

Allison shook her head, “You have a lot to learn, Mikhaira.”

From the information card Stiles had given her, Mikhaira was from an all-human territory, one of the very few left and was under Council protection. They had no magic of any kind and did things the extraordinarily human way.

“What made you come all the way to Beacon Hills?” Allison asked as she pulled Mikhaira’s suitcase from the portal.  “It’s quite a change from an all human territory.”

“That’s exactly why!” She said, taking her bag and following Allison to the front desk of the Azure to collect her keys and the packet with her name on it. “How can I be an emissary or move my territory forward if I’m doing the same thing that all the humans are doing?”

Allison nodded and pat her on the shoulder, “You’ll do well here.”

Erica and Boyd pick up Ayr who honestly looks as though she’s seconds away from spitting on them. Erica did her best to smile and be nice as Stiles did explain that Ayr was from a territory in Nevada that was outside of Council rule but just barely above a Hostiles territory and only knew of Beacon Hills what was available to her through Council training. She looks up at the sky to the rippling over head of the barrier and to Erica and Boyd.

“Somehow, you aren’t what I imagined to be a part of the Pack,” she said looking them over.

Erica let out a sound and regarded the woman, knives strapped to both thighs, high boots that were well-worn, and clothes that looked as though they were made for the desert. She was from a war place.

“It’s nice to meet you Ayr, I’m Erica, this is Boyd. We’ll be waiting here for just a few more--”

“Oh my god, _Twitchy._ ”

Boyd blinked, Ayr rose an eyebrow and Erica seemed frozen in place.

Three women, with various volumes of curls came towards them all dressed in the height of fashion and very obviously vampyr. There was something in their features that Boyd recognized, though they were all identical to his eyes. They had a bit of an accent that he couldn’t place, but it sounded like Erica sometimes when she--

_Sisters…_

If there was any vampyr that she could have handled coming through that portal, it wasn’t Evelyn, Emma, or Elena… her elder sisters. What the hell were they doing her all the way from Amsterdam? They weren’t who she and Boyd were supposed to be picking up.

She felt it, a twitch in her leg and she gripped her hands tighter, offering a smile, all teeth and rage.

“What an unpleasant surprise.”

*

Stiles gets the text in the middle of drawing magic circles and getting splashes with leviathan saliva as the virus rages in the man’s body. He’s screaming and thrashing beneath the restraints on him. He knows it doesn’t look good from where his wife, Lai, and their daughter stands outside.

“Just a little longer, Havi. I promise, just a little longer.”

He finished the circle and forces magic into it. Havi’s body seizes and from his mouth, a great glowing red cloud comes. Stiles casts a net of magic over it, making it thicker, denser, compressing it into an orb that floats harmlessly nearby. The room looks like he’s been fighting creatures of the underworld. He wipes his face and checks Havi’s breathing: stable.

He’d done it.

“Stiles?” Lai asks through the intercom.

Stiles waves over his head, collecting the dark ooze into the awaiting biohazard container and nods.

“He’s stable, I’ll get him cleaned up and out of here.”

It doesn’t take long to wheel him to somewhere they can be with him. He’ll be out of it for a while, but he should be fine. On the way to the sick bay where leviathans of all ages are beginning to exhibit the symptoms he has his phone read the text to him.

_The vampyr are related to Erica. Derek knows. Erica’s had a seizure. Call._

Just when he thought it would all go right… He tells all the treating doctors that he’s closing the sick bay and asks everyone bear with him for a moment before dialing 7 and waiting. Erica picks up on the fourth ring.

“ _Hello?_ ”

“Hey Cat Woman,” he said, closing the doors and drawing a large magic circle over the main doors. “I hear you’ve had a rough few hours. How are you feeling?”

“I’m… better…”

“Wanna talk about it?’

“No.”

“I’m sorry,” Stiles said. “If I knew--”

“There was no way you could have known. Don’t beat yourself up about it. My fault for not reading the card.”

“You at the Barracks?”

She hummed, “Alpha’s frying chicken and making cobbler.”

He snorted, “Spoiled.”

“Are you coming back on time?”

Stiles finished the first seal and went to the second pair of doors to write the second, before placing both of his hands against the back one.

“Should be able to.”

He took a deep breath listening to her talk about the elf girl’s reaction to her and Boyd and how utterly ridiculous her sisters had been dressed as he forced magic to oscillate between the two seals and resonate with the larger seal he’d drawn in Havi’s saliva along the walls of the sick bay. He heard people falling over, slumping down, asleep and watched the containment orb get larger and larger until the spell ended. The sigils vanished as the sickness was taken from the room and Stiles let out a relieved sigh.

He was supposed to be in D.C. for research, yet somehow Lai had contacted him for help in Rhode Island and he couldn’t deny her. Erica told him that they’d talk later as she was due for fried chicken and a Pack meeting about the triplets.

“Come back soon, Batman.”

“Will do. Don’t feel bad if you have to claw their faces off.”

She snorted, “I would never.”

Lai and her daughter found him sitting on a chair in the sick bay fiddling with the containment shell, running analysis, she gasped and stumbled as a puff of red smoke exits her mouth and joins the rest in the containment orb.

“Mom?” The little girl asked.

“I’m… fine…”

Stiles nodded and pat the seats next to him for them to join him as he continues to analyze it. It’s a curse, he knows that, but finding the matrix behind it or its origin would take him sometime. Rather than pretending as though he had the time, he set the orb in a containment room and drew a larger seal around the hospital after instructing everyone to take a visit there once he was done.

“I’ll be back to figure it out and hopefully dispel the curse entirely.”

Lai nodded and thanked him for detouring before he drew a separate circle around the orb and a barrier to contain the curse in lieu of the orb. After that, he said goodbye, told them to call if anything happened, and headed back to D.C. where there were a stack of books with his name on them.

He took a seat, set his phone in front of him and continued reading from where he left off.

Erica, swaddled in her favorite blanket on the couch, ate with a ferocity that didn’t surprise them. She’d told them all a fake back story for a reason and while Scott was the only one to believe it, the fact that she had one at all meant that her family was trouble.

“I’m a Reyes of Amsterdam,” she said after nearly drowning the next batch of chicken in hot sauce: mango habanero, one thing that she and Lydia could definitely agree on. “I’m the daughter they don’t like to talk about. I was born human and had seizures for a long time. Ironically, I manifested when I got to Beacon Hills after slumming it in the South for a while.”

“The South? How the hell did you get there?”

“I portal jumped from Germany to North Carolina and kept jumping to wherever the portal could take me.”

It had been a long road honestly, she’d ran away with a bag of clothes, whatever money her parents had been bribing her with to pretend she was a cousin, and the knowledge that anywhere was better than there.

“I ended up in Mariposa and got put on a poaching truck headed into the Hostiles. I picked the lock and ran and kept running till I unknowingly reached Beacon Hills six years ago.”

It had been the height of summer when she’d run from a gigantic ogre intent on smashing her brains out and he ran straight into the barrier she’d run through. She’d thought she was crazy, lost her mind, but when the ogre only growled at her and turned away, she knew she’d made it somewhere insane.

“I met Lenara that night, she took me in, enrolled me in school and didn’t ask questions. I manifested about two days afterward.”

Lenara told her that the seizures were symptomatic of something else beneath her purely vampyr heritage. What it was she wasn’t sure, but when she began to start fires a few months ago, Lenara figured it out.

“Not a legitimate Reyes,” she said. “My father isn’t the Lord William Reyes of the Reyes coven. Don’t know who he is, but Lenara bets on a demon of some sort.”

“Would explain somethings,” Kira said with a smirk Erica wrinkled her nose.

“Hence the fire wielding?”

She nodded, “Hence the fire-wielding.”

Scott grinned, shimmering a bit with excitement, “This is awesome, we’ve got all the supers of every race! All we’re missing is ...a were-dragon, an elf….We’re going to build the greatest pack ever!”

Derek ruffled her hair and set Anai next to her to snuggle with as they all finished eating and laid out to watch a movie.

Derek gets a call from Stiles the morning after. A simple check in to make sure that Derek and Erica haven’t resorted to mauling anyone. He’d given Erica some time off with Boyd to calm herself and get her feet back under her. Everyone else went to pick up the stragglers. Stiles had arranged for their housing to be set up similar to the Barracks. The Azure was usually used as a Bed and Breakfast for people coming into Beacon Hills for just a few days. It had been the original safe house before Talia built the North and East Safe Houses and Derek built the remaining cardinal houses and turned The Azure into a Bed and Breakfast. The whole house shared a large kitchen and five bathrooms throughout the house. It was close to the rail line and of course in Beacon Hills City proper.

He was right in assuming that they would be too exhausted to do anything. Most of them went to their rooms and collapsed. The front desk shut down as soon as the last inhabitant, one Alexandros Makos, had arrived. He’d been delayed due to an issue in his school’s territory that he volunteered to help with.

Derek went while they were all asleep to stock the refrigerator with food and leave letters for them all regarding when they would be meeting with him and the days ahead. Scott and Jackson led the daylong tour of Beacon Hills on the rail line. The walk around the museum , catch lunch at the best pizza parlor _ever_ , stop at the pixie bakery, see the new and improved Bentley stationed in the City Hall courtyard.

“It looks like the City Hall in Vatican.”

Scott grinned, “That’s because it was modeled after it, except there’s actual gold in our flooring and it’s bigger of course.”

The library is gigantic and they get them registered as users of the library and able to check out books per Stiles’s instructions. When they return them to the Azure stuffed with food from the local diner, they barely groan their goodnights before disappearing into their rooms. Jackson and Scott snickered, it was kind of hard to keep up with a faerie and pixie after all.

The next day nineteen are split up among the pack, the three sisters are given to Lydia and the Pack finds out exactly how devious Lydia could be. When Lydia returns, Erica hugs her and offers her a bottle of Sudden Death. Derek knows it’s the beginning of a long lasting friendship. Derek and Anai spend the night at the Barracks playing board games and falling asleep in the middle of the living room with whoever wasn’t scheduled for night patrol.

The day after, Derek dresses as relaxed as possible and gets Anai dressed for the day in record time. While never fussy, her body temperature hadn’t stabilized yet so there was never any way to figure out if she was going to be too hot or too cold. Today, she’s shivering so he tugs on wiccan red tights, a black jean skirt, and a red Henley. Lydia’s jaw dropped.

“You’re infecting her,” she complained.

Anai giggled and let Lydia tie the bow in her hair and donning the small backpack Lydia gave her. Today, the tiny Camaro would be inside City Hall and towing a trailer full of papers that Charlie needed delivered.

Derek prays for the strength to get through the meetings with his rage still in check. Aurora’s goes fairly quickly, easily even and she takes the rail to the University for whatever classes she’s been signed up for. Raven Pendragon, dressed for seduction and doused in perfume, makes his wolf growl. She’s annoying and very obviously came to Beacon Hills because of his face rather than wanting to learn anything about the territory. While potentially more useful than Aurora, she was just as annoying.

When Ayr comes in to the conference room, he isn’t sure what to expect. She’s dressed as if she expects an attack on her life at all time. She takes a seat and regards him with old eyes that have learned a lot but have no understanding of Beacon Hills or Council politics.

“The barrier must be nice,” she said.

“It can be.”

She nodded, “I’ve only seen Allison armed at all times. Everyone must be rather comfortable. Is it normal for a human to be so armed?”

Derek snorted and gave her a smile, “I can see that your understanding of Beacon Hills is skewed. All of the pack is always armed. Allison is from a family of Hunters, the argents to be specific.”

“I mean no offense Alpha Hale, but what is there to be skewed? You’re a territory with an impenetrable barrier--it’s not a wonder that everyone who isn’t human would be soft.”

Derek smiled, “Why did you come to Beacon Hills if you thought we were just hiding behind our barrier?”

She met his eyes, “To learn it and find a way to provide one for my own territory.”

Honest answer, one of the most solid ones he’s gotten all day which he appreciated beyond a doubt. He took a note for that and smiled.

“An admirable reason,” Derek said with a nod. “Whether you’ll learn our barrier or be inspired on how to create your own, I have no doubt that you will learn a great deal here. In case you weren’t aware, the barrier has only been active for nine years… Beacon Hills was established over three centuries ago. The peace that we’ve enjoyed under the barrier is a new luxury, one that we don’t take advantage of as you will learn. We have lost a great deal to have it and don’t think for a moment that it makes us invincible.”

Ayr eyes him, not quite understanding why the Lycan had such things to say to her. What could he possibly know about struggle? When she leaves, she glances up to the sky to see another ripple and wonder why her mother suggested Beacon Hills of all places beside the barrier. What was it about Beacon Hills anyway?

She supposed that she would have to figure it out in the next few months if she were able.

*

Marq, the were-dragon who had apparently never manifested, had been told about Beacon Hills by his parents who were no longer alive.

“They were from a red and black dragon clan…” he said with a tight smile. “They died before I can remember on the way to Beacon Hills.”

Derek nodded, “I hope you find the answers you’re looking for.”

Derek could tell that the young were-dragon was confused by his words, “You aren’t the only one who comes to Beacon Hills seeking answers that your parents can no longer give you.”

Surprisingly, most of the remaining students chose Beacon Hills simple because they were either interested in Derek or curious about Beacon Hills as a territory that was more than just unique but damn near unacknowledged by the Council.

Somehow, he knew that his meeting with Rosalina would be different. The Lycan population in Beacon Hills had plummeted to two according to the most recent census of the territory. Lycans were known to stay where they were born and if they left, it was because their mate was from a different territory. When the Hale Fire ripped the majority of the Hale family from the world, those who’d survived went to New York and South to where the original Hales were from seeking comfort and familiarity in the wake of the fire.

When Laura returned, she’d been the only Lycan in the territory. Replaced by Peter, and then by Derek. Anai made the second so it was needless to say that Derek had very little interactions with Lycans. He had no concept of Lycan etiquette in other territories as Talia was strictly anti-Lycan rules.

So when she came in, her head bowed, shuffling forward and waiting behind the chair, he wasn’t sure what to make of it. Her neck was bared, an easy show of submission, but the down cast eyes and the words threw him off completely.

“You summoned me, Alpha?”

He looked at the desk, set up with food for them and then looked to her, “Please have a seat, Rosalina. Derek, is fine. I’m not even your alpha.”

She swallowed and shuffled, careful not to make a sound when drawing the chair out and taking a seat.

“I arranged for us to have lunch together as I’m sure, coming from an all Lycan territory, you have questions about Beacon Hills.”

She swallowed and her heart was hammering in her chest.

“Yes, if you would permit me to ask them.”

He frowned, “You’re allowed to ask whatever you wish. You’re a guest, Rosalina. Please, no need to be tense.”

That seemed to only make her tenser as he grabbed his fork and knife and began to cut in to the steak in front of him. When she made no move to follow suit he tilted his head.

“Are you not hungry?”

“Yes, I am.”

“I only ask because you aren’t eating.”

“You… haven’t finished eating.”

_What?_

“Rosalina look at me.”

Her eyes shot up but did not meet his. Her neck bared, her eyes glowing gold, she was terrified.

“There’s no reason to be afraid of me,” he said with a smile. “I arranged lunch so we could eat together. Please, eat. The steak will get cold and while still good, this is the kind of steak you should eat when hot.”

She reached hesitantly for her fork and knife under his watch and began to cut into the steak. It was tender, an exceptional cut, probably the best cut she would ever have in her entire life. In Madrid, the hierarchy was strictly observed, as an omega, she quite often got whatever was left at the dinner table after her alpha father, beta mother and siblings were done.

“I take it that things are different in Madrid?”

She nodded slowly, “Very, Sir.”

“Just Derek,” he said with a smile. “As I said you’re a guest, and I’m not that much older than you. Please ask your questions.”

She swallowed, “There… aren’t many Lycans here…”

“No.”

“Why is that?’

“The Hales made up the Lycan population, after the fire they went to their birth territories.”

She nodded slowly, chewing thoughtfully. It really was a good steak and before she realized it, she was done and he was offering her another one.

“You’re welcome to it, there are plenty.”

“How is that?” She asked.

In Madrid, they were suffering a shortage of meat that even the Ochoa family was feeling the effects. When she’d last visited from school, there had barely been a scrap of chicken left for her at the end of the meal.

“Beacon Hills has a lot of farm land, we take care of ourselves and manage the livestock. There’s also the matter of centuries of dragon slaughters and what have you.”

She nodded remembering that they were next to a very large range of mountains home to a very large clan of dragons and had been since inception.

“Is there a shortage in Madrid?”

She nodded slowly, “As an all Lycan territory we eat a lot of meat…”

Derek nodded, “Well, while you’re here, feel free to eat all you’d like. “

“Has it always been this way? Not… run by Lycan rules?”

Derek snorted, “Talia Hale was very anti-Lycan rules… as was the entire Hale family.”

She nodded. They were very well respected but not well liked because of it.  Even though Derek’s father, Didac De Leon, had been practically blacklisted for fraternizing, marrying the Hales. The De Leon family were neighbors to her family and she remembered hearing how shameful they were. She’d seen Talia and Didac once when she was just a child.

She’d given her a beef sandwich and promptly clawed her parents for starving her.

Derek nodded, “Yes, well that was mom in a nutshell: clawing people for doing wrong.”

“You have no sense of Lycan culture do you?”

He shook his head, “Not a bit and from the way you’re reacting to me… I’m not sure if I want to either. Nor do I want Anai to either.”

“Anai?” She asked.

He nodded, “The other Lycan in the territory. You’ll meet her. She’s a tad shy, but I’m sure she’ll be delighted to have another Lycan around.”

Rosalina nodded and swallowed, trying to clear her head. There was something about Derek that she couldn’t really place. Something augmenting his alpha pull that made her heart race somewhat in fear. The alpha of her territory was a very old alpha, but he didn’t feel like this.

“You want to ask something,” Derek said humorously. “Ask.”

“It’s incredibly rude,” she started.

Derek shrugged, “Assume it’s not for me. What is it?”

“What… kind of wolf are you?”

He grinned, a blinding white and almost wolfish smile. She saw the picture in the Lycan Informer and had wondered what kind of wolf’s eyes glowed like that.

“I’m a black wolf.”

She swallowed, her eyes growing wide as her breath caught in her chest. An eyebrow lifted.

“Now I have questions….”

*

When Derek drops her off at the university, he’s oddly enlightened and she seems to have relaxed considerably. Stiles called soon after teasing him that he was going to learn a whole lot more about his Lycan side if he continued to hang out with her.

“You can go howling at the moon together, real romantic like.”

Derek snorted, “Shut the hell up Stiles, when are you coming back?”

“I should be back by tonight, no worries.”

Derek sends up a thank you to the heavens and heads back to City Hall. Anai has parked the tiny Camaro beside Charlie’s desk and is comfortably sleeping on the tiny cot in his office.

“She’s a very hard worker,” Charlie said with a grin.

“She’s a superhero,” he said lifting her from the cot and gathering her things before walking out towards his car and strapping her in comfortably.

He tucks her into her bed at the Hale House and lets Stiles in when he knocks.

That night, Anai has a nightmare and somehow the three of them end up cuddled together on Derek’s huge bed, beneath a thick blanket. A dream catching sigil hanging over the headboard and Anai is wrapped in Stiles’ battle cloak to protect her.

“She adores you,” Derek said, his arm resting over her protectively just above Stiles’s arm.

“She actually adores you,” Stiles said. “It’s that Lycan bond.”

“Get some sleep Stiles,” Derek said, drawing a hand over his cheek. “You smell exhausted.”

“You too big guy,” he said drowsily, humming and letting out a low rumble.

Derek grins, his wolf rumbling comfortable and drawing closer to the two in his bed. It smells like peace, home, and family and Derek wishes that it would always be that way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) I am shield-warrior and commander, as I speak it, as I command it with friends, against serpent, war-shield rise.  
> 2)Against dragon, I contend. I take flame and rage to strengthen my shield so that friends may remain safe, until victory is spoken.  
> 3) Victory


	16. How To Be An Emissary 101

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pendragons are assholes. Lydia is a badass. Stiles is a fountain of knowledge and slave driver. Derek has magic hands and a dirty mind. DEFCON 1 happens. Stiles is still a badass and Allison tells her father what it means to really be Pack. The Battle begins.
> 
> Warning: fun times with Derek and communing with the dead.

Derek wakes up to the sound of Anai and Stiles in the kitchen, making breakfast. He smells meat, pancakes, yogurt and a whole host of things. Hears them giggling and walks in on something that makes his heart quake. Anai is a red bundle on the counter, her hair tamed into a messy braid, giggling at the shapes Stiles makes on the griddle with the pancake batter.

It’s almost too adorable. They eat comfortably and Stiles gets ready for the day. While Derek isn’t heading into the office, he isn’t exactly off duty. Lydia was supposed to come get Anai for a day of bonding while Derek went on his own patrol around the territory. She arrived soon after Stiles is gone and after a whirl of fashion, they’re gone and Derek is left alone, warm, full, and happy. He knows that Stiles is meeting with all of the students in between their classes and starting their programs today.

He drives to the police station to catch the patrol van heading out for the day and feels that maybe today would be a better day than the days before.

*

Stiles’s first meeting crashes and burns. Raven Pendragon is just as difficult as her name implies all arrogance and superiority complex, just like her remembered. It was no wonder his Babcia made it a point to wipe the floor with the head of the Pendragon family every chance she got.

_They were assholes._

“You aren’t even a _real_ emissary, what can you teach me about being one?”

Stiles smiled, “You can always return to Wales.”

She blanched, “You would send me back?”

“Try me,” he said.

“I’m a Pendragon!”

“And I’m acting emissary,” Stiles growled. “Derek has no time for petulant children and neither do I. So you’ll do as I say or you’ll go home.”

She stormed out the moment his threat was clearly a promise. It would be like pulling teeth with that one it seemed, but he had no worries about it really. It would burn the Pendragon pride to be sent home so at the very least she would do as he said. Not to mention, to be sent home from a territory stay meant that she’d have to undergo the alternative: an extra year of training and a black mark on her record. After all, he’d submitted everything he was going to have them doing to their respective schools for clearance before they’d had a chance to decided which territory they wanted to go to. He knew for certain that the things he would be teaching them would put them levels above the rest of the students and boost their rankings among their class as well. It was in her best interest to tough it out no matter how it burned her pride to have to listen to him.

Aurora was no better, still holding on to the belief that he’d stolen her place. Determined to have it back, he wasn’t sure whether to tell her she was an idiot or to let her to continue to flounder. At the very least, everyone else was fairly easy to deal with. Marq was the easiest once they’d gotten past the “are you Stiles, the dragon tamer Stiles?” and “I already know you’re a dragon healer and a red-black mix”.  Mikhaira was just excited to be learning anything new. Ayr was wary of his intentions until he explained to her that he lived in the Hostiles for three years and assured her that Beacon Hills was not a place that she had to worry about “growing soft” in. After getting Vlad into clothes suitable for California, he was fit for anything, as was Alexandros of Athens.

Once the meetings were done, he gathered them together in a large study room in the library, set them up with their own sets of books and began to lecture. After an hour, they went to the police station for physical training with the extended pack. Ayr and Marq were leagues ahead of the rest in terms of physical combat. Mikhaira was serviceable, while the other were a little better than useless. He wasn’t surprising, the rest of them relied heavily on their powers and were from Council territories that very rarely had any issues.

And then Lydia came to visit with Anai by her side and they got stupid.

“What an angel.”

Lydia gave the boy a look and then looked at Stiles.

“May I introduce Miss Lydia Martin. Any takers?”

She grinned, taking off her pumps and tossing her hair over her shoulder, “Got to set an example for the next generation of beautiful women.”

Anai watched on in fascination as Stiles chuckled and checked his watch. They had another thirty minutes or so before he wanted to get them reading.

The one who’d called her an angel stepped forward, “I’ll go easy on you, Princess.”

Lydia had him on the ground and in pain in less than a few seconds without disturbing her pristine outfit. The next three fall just as soon and Anai cheers.

“That was so cool! Can you teach me how to do that?”

She grinned down, slipping on her shoes and tossing her hair, taking Anai’s hand, “Sure thing munchkin, but I bet it would be cooler to have Derek teach you.”

Her eyes went bright and shiny as Lydia lead her out of the training room and Stiles addressed underestimating your opponent and over estimating your own strength. After everyone else has been thrown around for a bit, he takes them back to the library, sets them up in cubicles and gives them each a stack of books to read on various subjects and a prompt.

“Read and answer the question, I’ll be back in two hours, then you’re free to go for the day. We’re training with the Pack tomorrow so wear something comfortable.”

When he returns, in two hours they haven’t finished reading, and or, they’ve answered the question with no knowledge at all. Stiles is pleased to tell them that those who are still reading, they can take the books back to The Azure with them and turn in their answers tomorrow before training. He’d grade the six responses tonight and give them back their work after logging their grades.

Grading them is quick work. He’d given them questions on cultures that were the furthest from their own so they couldn’t rely on any knowledge of their own territory culture or species. They were very specific to certain territories and taken from renditions of emissary practice test questions.

All six of them failed as there was a distinct lack of citation and solid information, but he didn’t write “failure” on them--he wrote “Rejected. Prepare for an invasion.” In the morning, the remaining students hand over their essays over breakfast and the six who turned them in the day before are indignant.

“What the hell does that mean?” Raven asked gawking at her paper.

“You didn’t read the scenario and completely disregarded the politics inherent in the situation, thus your answer is not only completely invalid, but offensive. You cannot rely on your species’ way of doing things to solve interspecies issues. Congratulations, you’ve pissed off the neighboring vampyr coven and now your human territory will more than likely invaded and forced to be blood slaves.”

She fumed, “My answer was valid!”

“For a wiccan, but you were representing a _human_ territory to a vampyr coven.”

“I don’t plan on going to a human territory!”

“But you may have to deal with one, and you may end up at one anyway if you don’t rank high enough.”

She growled, “ _I’m a Pendragon_ , I rank higher than everyone here!”

Stiles snorted, “You’ll never pass the emissary test with that attitude.”

“How would you know? You can’t take it otherwise you’d be an _emissary_ not a consultant.”

She gave him that smug look and he laughed, “Someone bring me a book, apparently, Miss Pendragon needs proof that I’m qualified and I’d rather get this over now.”

She laughed and whipped out her tablet, “No need. I have the emissary study materials right here.”

Stiles nodded, “Do your worst.”

The scenario was simple. He was greeting an elf elder, preparing for talks about cutting down parts of the forest around his territory to build a common meeting place between the territories. It was not explained in truce set forth that created the tenuous alliance.

Stiles assumed that there had been a history of the problem, and the territory he was representing was a human one.

“Where is the territory?” Stiles asked.

“Why would that matter?” She asked.

“Because there are different modes of address between elvish clans.”

She hadn’t known that, she figured it was like Wiccan—a standard language that everyone read, “It doesn’t say.”

He nodded and went through his mind for the likely place it would be, elves and humans weren’t known to live near one another except near jungles like the Amazon. So he assumed the amazon and took a deep breath, standing straight and turning to Ayr extending a hand through the air and turning his palm up, the other across his chest and meeting her eyes.

“D'anthe Rolari, xuil vel'uss udos inbal entered biu inthigg whol gre'as'anto lueth folggash, usstan doer ulu naran natha rivvin talthalra k'lar pholor lil' marta de' udossta mar ji nindel udos xal doer ul'naus pholor melko eairthin.” 1

Her tablet beeped: _Correct. You negotiation is off to a good start._

“What are the Rites of Heironim?”

“The pact between Wiccans and dragons across all territories and a part of dragon dogmatic law. It dictates the conduct between races and the rules of engagement between wiccans and dragons in unmarked territory, specifically stating that whoever’s territory is closer has jurisdiction over the proceedings. This rule of course extends to all species. It’s named after Claudia Heironim who was the official negotiator between the Wiccan elders and the Head Dragon clan at the time the pact was made.”

_Correct._

She growled flipping to the more advanced questions, but Stiles spoke in an even voice, calmly, almost bored, rattling off information and enjoying the “ _Correct_ ” after every answer. She ran out of questions ask everyone finished breakfast and remained fuming.

“Are you satisfied now?”

She huffed and turned to march out of the door. Stiles snickered and followed behind. Boyd was outside in a truck. Raven climbed into the passenger seat of the jeep next to Stiles and continued to quiz him with a different test prep program as the Jeep followed Boyd out beyond the city and into the forest where they always trained.

They trained so far away because it was safer and in case someone got a little carried away. Even Anai was there in tiny workout clothes, looking far more stylish than most of the pack, courtesy of Lydia. Raven only grumbled the entire way about Stiles’s obvious qualifications.  When the stopped and climbed out, Derek was spinning Anai around at the edge of the clearing and the rest of the Pack seemed to be chatting on various topics.

When they were all out of the car, Derek set Anai on the boulder at the edge of the clearing and gave her the stopwatch.

“Good Morning everyone,” Derek greeted watching everyone assemble.

The Pack in a straight light of eight off to his left, the emissary children in two staggered lines in front of them. Stiles moved to Anai’s side to draw a protection circle around her and give her earplugs. Derek in a tank top and jeans, wearing his normal boots looked like sin and was probably more distracting than he ever would admit.

Stiles went to join the side of the Pack before moving closer to Derek.

“We have training together as a Pack once a week, but everyone you see here goes through their own training, specific to their skills every day.”

Ayr looked intrigued at the thought. She would have never guessed a training regimen like that.

“Stiles has asked that you all be included for the duration that you’re here. We’re holding it later than we usually do to be nice. Starting next week, it will be back at dawn. Stiles?”

He grinned, “I’ve already gotten a feel for your hand to hand combat skills. We’ll be looking at your other abilities today. Spell casting, magic wielding, weapons, that sort of thing. Consider it a benchmark. We’ll have another one half-way through your stay and another at the end.”

Derek lead the Pack through their normal exercise: a run for warm up, then tag fighting, then power usage while Stiles paired up the emissary children. It was obvious who had some training and Mikhaira surprised him by pulling out a spring-loaded scythe and nearly taking Alexandros’ head off with it. She was at once graceful and spontaneous and leaps ahead in her scythe work than Alexandros in his sword-play. Scythes were hard to manage, let alone scythes of that size.

_Definitely impressive…_

While Raven could cast powerful spells, her spell work wasn’t fast enough which cost her the duel against Ayr who used her blades and magic seamlessly.  Marq’s technique was subtle. Stiles almost missed the concentrated magic in his palms that he could shoot out through the air making it impossible for Aurora to do anything but move out of the way or be cut to pieces.

When the Pack comes back laughing, looking as though they’d been blown up Stiles can only ask what happened.

“Ran beyond the barrier,” Boyd explained. “Ogre, hellhound, _and_ a chimera, a mature one too.”

Erica laughed, “Did you see it’s _face_?”

Scott made a face that sent the whole Pack into another peel of laughter. He could only guess that it reacted that way to Erica and Kira catching its fire and redirecting it. Once it was clear that everyone was all right, they took a sideline to watching the emissaries follow Stiles through a set of exercises before they stopped for the day and it was time for lunch.

They headed back to the city. The Pack grabbed lunch and a shower before rushing out across the territory for whatever they had to do. Stiles got the trainees back to the Azure to eat, shower and then settled in the library for another round of reading and questions while he graded the papers he’d collected that morning. He logged the grades and set the pages face down in front of their owners, before telling them that he’d be back and it was the same deal as the day before. He’d be splitting them up the next day among the territory according to their interests and abilities.

They’re there for a week before it becomes obvious that Stiles is a bit of a slave driver and seventy percent of them are a bit more than stupid. When he comes to pick them up, he hears the tail end of a conversation that shouldn’t be happening between Raven, Aurora, and three other girls regrading Derek.

“I mean if it was good enough to burn his house down…”

It takes everything in him not storm in, but luckily he doesn’t have to. There’s a growl and a thud of a body against a ground.

“You know nothing of what it means to lose Pack! To lose everything! Do not treat his pain lightly or I’ll rip your throat out with my teeth, _witch_.”

“I’ll curse you where you stand, _bitch._ ”

Stiles enters then, throwing up a barrier between the two and taking a deep breath. Rosalina’s eyes are glowing gold and Raven is prepared to cast a spell.

“I’m going to make this a learning moment for both of you, and a warning for you all,” Stiles said calmly. “Raven when you don’t understand a culture, when you don’t think beyond yourself, you not only endanger the territory you’re representing, but yourself. I could have very easily let her rip your throat out as we all know her claws are faster than your spellwork.”

Raven’s eyes narrowed.

“Rosalina, the key to negotiation is to maintain a poker face at all time, until the last moment when you rip someone’s throat out. Give your opponent no warning as they should have had the awareness to know they were crossing a line.”

Rosalina’s jaw dropped at the words as the barrier dissolved and he looked at the rest of the room who were somewhere in between shocked and disgusted.

“For everyone, I don’t expect you not to gossip about Beacon Hills, about Derek, about the Pack and the way things are done here. If you didn’t, I’d be worried. That being said unless you’d like to feel the edge of a sword, arrow, black pixie dust, claws, tiny claws, faerie light, fangs, a fist, and any other weapon anyone in Beacon Hills can wield, you will not speak lightly of Derek’s past. If it happens again, there are only two options: I let the pack have their way with you or I ship your ass home. Understand?”

Raven says nothing, but the other girls nod.

“Raven.”

She glared at him, “I got it.”

“Good, hand over your essays. I trust that if you have time to gossip, then they’re perfect.”

They do so and so the day begins.

*

Stiles limps into the Hale House one day, a little over a month into the emissary homestay, staggering towards the couch and falling forward. It’s late. Anai is staying with the Pack at the Barracks for movie night and bonding with them while Derek tries to cram his head full of more information about barriers and finishes other work for the territory: repairs from the recent attacks, barrier patrols, etc.

“Stiles?” Derek asked getting up and heading into the room to see Stiles lying oddly still on the couch. Derek bumped into his leg and got a groan out of the other.

“Please… don’t touch me…”

Derek snorted, “You’re running yourself ragged aren’t you?”

“You try running How To Be An Emissary 101 for a group that’s about seventy percent self-entitled assholes.”

Derek laughed, closing the book, “You’ve been running around haven’t you? More than usual?”

He groaned, “Between my own research and keeping them in line? Yes. I’ve been running around.”

Derek set the book down and moved to roll Stiles over and heft him off his couch and over his shoulder.

“Come on,” he said. “I’ll give you a massage.”

“Ugh,” he groaned. “Don’t…I’m ticklish.”

“I’ll keep that under advisement.”

It doesn’t help that Derek manhandles him into just his boxer briefs and lays him out on the bed. It doesn’t help that whatever oil he’s using smells really good and Derek’s hands are Lycan warm and kneading at knots he didn’t even know were there. It really doesn’t help that Derek’s wolf is present, leaking Lycan magic into his system making him feel more wolfy by the second until a contented rumble erupts from his chest and he whines when Derek presses his thumbs into the small of his back in small persistent circles. His magic is pulsing content moonlit waves.

 _Alpha attention,_ it says happily. _More attention, please._

Stiles isn’t sure if it’s some combination of Lycan magic in his body and his general low grade arousal or what, but Derek’s hands are like magic, spreading to all the tense places, relaxing and healing them all at one time. There was a reason Lycan almost never needed a physical massage: their regeneration rate kept them rather springy. Lucky bastards.

Stiles moaned as Derek began to dig at a spot in his lower back, working the muscles apart.

“Fuck.”

Derek grunted, “You’re tense.”

“I noticed.”

On the other hand, Derek is having a hard time keeping his wolf at bay. Stiles is pale all over, dotted with moles and smells good even with the absence of whatever is missing from his scent. There are circles down his back, filled with symbols like tattoos inked into his skin. He can’t read them except for the small arch of words at the nape of his neck, but he knows they mean something simply from the number and their placement.

_Ancra ond insigleum adlibbendes_

He wants to lick them, follow the curve of every inked line with his tongue. He’s toned from years of fighting, his ass is rounded and wiggling at every roll of his fingers—inviting. His wolf is growling to mount him and fuck him senseless.

 _The only way to get rid of temptation is to yield to it,_ Lenara said in between him fumbling around with what exactly he was feeling about Stiles since the first time the man had joined them for Pack training.

As usual, her suggestion involved lube, a closed door, and two (or more) bodies on a flat surface.  Having Stiles naked underneath his hands now was definitely not helping the insistent press of his cock against his sweatpants. Stiles’s constant low-grade arousal getting stronger the longer he had his hands on him wasn’t helping either.

Stiles whined as he slid his hands lower, pressing the heel of his palm into the muscle of his ass until the knots loosened and continuing down the backs of his legs. By the time he was done, Stiles smelled like he was about to start rutting into the mattress and Derek had a problem that wouldn’t go away soon.

“Better?” He managed, his voice sounding wrecked to his ears.

“Yeah,” Stiles aid dreamily. “ _Thanks._ ”

Derek tells him to get some sleep in a voice he hopes doesn’t sound rushed, pulls the blanket over his mostly naked body and escapes the room to head to his own bedroom on the top floor of the house. He closes the door to try and blot out Stiles’s scent, but quickly realizes that it still lingered in his sheets from the night they’d spent guarding over Anai. The dream catcher had been moved to her room, but the scents still lingered. He groaned, laying across the bed and sinking into the smell. He didn’t have time to be attracted to Stiles. Any day the barrier could be coming down and DEFCON 1 could be screaming down their necks. He didn’t have…

_Fuck._

His wolf thrashed, hurrying him along to slide his hands into his sweatpants, bury his face in the pillow Stiles had slept on, squeeze tight, shut his eyes and piston his hips as images flickered behind his eyelids. Stiles’s hands, always fucking moving, doing something, completely still, clenched around Derek’s thighs, holding on for dear life as Derek stroked into that damned mouth that played hell on his sense of control. Full lips burning red and tight around him, hollowed cheeks, and cum-wet lips. The slick noise a phantom in his ear, conjured by some distant memory, but better, much better for the sound of Stiles’s whimpering, quiet begging to be used to Derek’s content.

“ _Stiles…_ ” He heard himself gasping, his hips moving faster, thrusting harder into slick grip of his hand, half massage oil, and half pre-cum and wishing it was something else.

His hands still smelled like Stiles and massage oil. Sheets that smelled like him, filling his head and dragging his wolf to the surface. Fuck, how far could Stiles take him? Down his throat? If he wanted, Stiles would be good for him, good enough to relax his jaw and let him fuck his throat as hard as we wanted to, until Stiles couldn’t speak the next day and he almost choked on Derek’s cum. He swore he could feel Stiles’s throat clenching around him and gasped for sanity as his hips moved faster.

Those damn eyes usually teasing, looking up at him hopefully bright, damn near glowing amber, pleading moans and clenching fingertips. He felt his orgasm storm through him, slashing through all semblance of control until the pillow cover ripped and he was a sticky, hot mess in the center of his bed. Still hard, but his head was a little clearer and the fantasy came into a startling clarity.

Something in him wanted to take Stiles like a Lycan, all dominance and passion, the sort of fucking that left them both a shaking mess on the forest floor. Dirty, sticky passion that blossomed in hot red patched on Stiles’s skin, on his neck where Derek would sink his human teeth into, his hips where Derek’s hand held him and fucked him into the forest floor, in Stiles’s lips bruised from kisses and being stretched around Derek’s cock. He wanted to _own_ Stiles…mount him, claim him...

_Mate him._

Fucking Lenara putting images in his head…

Fucking Stiles for smelling so good….

Fucking Derek for not fucking Stiles.

*

Stiles hasn’t slept that long and that deep since before Claudia died. It’s like swimming to the surface from the depth of a lake. Sound and light come slowly until you break the surface and it’s all there in stark relief. He’s covered, in the Hale House, in a guest room, and in just his boxers which are slightly damp and he flushed.

Derek had probably smelled it before Stiles had ever felt it.

It hadn’t been his fault really, between Lenara’s insistent teasing and Stiles’s own natural constant state of arousal. But they’d been through too much together not to give each other some slack. They were both young male adults who hadn’t exactly had the easiest road to the present. If a simple massage and an accidental hard-on disturbed the trust and peace they’d built then it wasn’t trust or peace at all.

After all, shit just happened.

He managed to drag himself to the bathroom, shower and pull on a set of clothes that he’d left there in case of an accidental sleep over before wandering towards the kitchen. It smelled like a breakfast feast.

“Is the Pack coming for breakfast?”

Derek turned slowly, eyeing him warily, his nostrils flared before looking away, “I’m sure they will.”

That was an odd statement to make given the amount of food Derek made. Stiles shrugged it off as Derek’s Lycan instincts pushing him to provide food for someone he saw as Pack and took a seat at the table. He sent a text off to Scott, who was bound to be up, before beginning to eat.

“If you aren’t too busy tonight,” Stiles started. “Wanted to show you something.”

Derek looked at him, “Like?”

“Well it’s a full moon so it’s the best time to do it. Will Isaac be okay alone?”

He nodded, “He’ll be fine. Allison will stay with him and I’m sure Scott won’t mind a little more time to bond with Anai.”

He snorted, no, Scott wouldn’t. The last time they’d hung out together, they’d been eating lollipop’s together: Scott’s was cotton candy blue and Anai’s was a tiny, lamb chop still on the bone. The amount of cheer Scott exhibited was perfect for entertaining a small child.

Stiles finished eating as the pack arrived. Anai rushed straight into Derek’s arms as Stiles went to start his morning news review for the territory.

An loud buzzer sounded from everyone’s phone as he was scrolling through his usual news feed. The room went quiet. A green alert was never good.

Stiles watched the message appear:

_32 Emissary Schools attacked across the world. Possible terrorist attack._

Derek lifted Anai from the ground as the Pack moved to turn on the television in the room.

“Stay right here,” he told her, kissing her cheek and setting her up with breakfast she could feed herself.

He went to the larger room where they held Pack Night when he hosted and watched the new reporter on the scene of the burnt ruins in the middle of the city.

“ _I’m getting reports that all the attacks happened at the exact same time. Everywhere from Madrid to Maricopa has been hit. We aren’t sure if anyone has been hurt yet, but as you can see—_ ”

The camera flipped over and they could hear the woman screaming, “Let me go! Let me go!”

The feed went dark before it returned to the news anchor in Vatican. She had the nerve to look grave as she listed off the schools that had been attacked and the other attacks that occurred across territories. Another feed came in, a different woman her face splattered with blood.

“ _Please help, they’re coming. Please someone—_ “

The feed cut out against with a scream and a loud roar. Stiles felt his stomach turn over before Erica turned off the Television and for a moment, they just sat in silence.

“Maricopa isn’t far from here,” Derek said. “There will be people rushing this way for safety if they know Beacon Hills is here.”

Boyd was to get to the oracles, figure out what they could find about the attacks, Lydia would go with him in case she heard anything. Better they to know what else could happen and be prepared.

Jackson and Kira were to get the sentinels organized for the influx of people that were sure to come and the insanity that was bound to follow. Scott was to go to the hospital and get everyone on alert and anyone who was able ready to move out in less than an hour.

“Erica,” he said looking at her, “Isaac, Allison, check the safe houses, if there’s something missing, get it. I don’t want to be behind when they come. Stiles with me, we need to alert everyone in the territory and neighboring territories, get the emissary kids under control, and contact their territories.”

Stiles nodded. With their orders, the Pack disbanded. Derek grabbed Anai put her in the Jeep with Stiles and they rolled out. Charlie turned on the Beacon Hills broadcasting system, giving Derek full control over it to alert everyone that emissary schools across the world have been attacked and they should be expecting an influx of people soon.

“Poker face, steady heart,” he said while Stiles was on the phone with the Madrid territory.

Alpha Torres didn’t seem to give a damn about Rosalina being in Beacon Hills. She wasn’t an alpha, thus wasn’t useful in a fight.

“Keep her,” he snarled. “I only need Lycans strong enough to be of use. Don’t contact her family. I need them focused.”

With that he hung up, it wasn’t surprising. He’d heard Alpha Daniel Torres was a complete and total asshole. The general consensus was for the students to stay there and to keep in touch. Stiles offered a prayer for them and offered as much help as possible.

Ironically, Mihkaira’s parents were the most honest, “We don’t expect the Council to help us. Just take care of her.”

It was chilling to think that even the people under Council protection didn’t believe in it. Looking over the map of the attacked schools, there was no real pattern beyond the fact that they were some of the most well-known schools. The only exception was the school in Vatican, Italy, Claudia’s alma mater, it hadn’t been hit or perhaps it had been warded against any attack. Stiles wasn’t sure, but he was sure that Derek meant to do everything he could to get the situation settled.

Stiles was tasked with alerting the students about the attacks, telling them to call their parents and check in, their school have been notified and they’ve been asked to keep them until the situation blows over. Given that it was getting closer to the start of the new school year meant that Stiles was going to have to add to their training programs to keep them up to speed even when their schools were shut down.

Within the hour, they saw the beginnings of the refugees from the territories. Though the reports simply said “emissary schools” were attacked, they didn’t explain that in the confusion poaching operations had gone into overdrive. In all the confusion, who would notice a few people snatched off the streets. The only reason Beacon Hills wasn’t hit was because of the barrier no doubt, but that didn’t mean that would last forever.

When their initial duties were done, the Pack moved to the out posts on all sides of the barrier, land and sea, to cover those running through the Hostiles. Neighboring territories aided the attempts while funneling their own people into Beacon Hills.

The disaster relief team rolled out within the hour with Stiles, Erica, Isaac and Allison as the protection detail to Maricopa. It’s chaos and Stiles is glad for his battle cloak because dragons and all other hosts of creatures swarm the city. He throws the cloak over him and a group of children, getting people into the nearest and sturdiest building. It’s the Territory Consulate that’s been warded against dragon attacks.

“Let me go!”

“Get in the fucking van!”

Stiles turns at the sound, running after the small voice screaming and the thrashing. He knows everyone else is busy and the dragon that’s about to burn them both to death doesn’t look like he cares that the poacher sucks at his job. It’s so fast, there’s no chance to breath. The fire comes down, Stiles throws his cloak around him, snatching the girl from the poacher’s arms in the middle of the struggle and stays still, cradling the girl as the man screams in agony. Charred and then eaten in two bites.

Stiles rises, drawing a blade of pure magic into his hand and swinging. It catches at the dragon’s neck, dragging against scales, but cuts its way through severing the head and letting the blood spurt out in a thick sticky rain over them.

The little girl looks up at him from the ground as he turns with eyes wide and trembling hands as he huffs and lets the magic dissolve.

“Let’s get you inside,” he says, lifting her and flying over the rubble. He manages to get her close enough to the building before it’s apparent that Allison needs back up.

Isaac is currently tangling with an ogre that’s grabbed him and thrown him through a solid stone wall. Erica is busy catching fiery blasts as people scurry into the building and Allison has been snatched up from the ground and damn near carried off.

“Stiles!” Erica yells after him as another dragon descends. “Allison!”

It doesn’t take long to find her, floating into the air and flying after her. She is of course, driving knives into the dragon’s leg or anywhere she can reach, but they all break, shattered against skin. Another dragon arrives, screeching at the one carrying her and grabs her leg. They tug and Allison refuses to scream, activating the spring loaded blades on her boots and kicking. It does nothing but agitate the newcomer, but it makes her feel like she’s fighting until the very end.

There’s a flash of light, and a beam that almost blinds her before she hears words, powerful angry words and sees a scarlet cloaked figure floating not too far. There’s screeching, angry and loud mixed with the words and suddenly she’s falling through the air and stopped just before meeting the ground.

When everything begins to go black, she wonders if dying hurts as much as people are afraid of it.

*

“…do you mean?”

 _Dad?_ Allison thought, groaning and opening her eyes. Chris Argent stood over her bed yelling at Isaac to her right. They were in Beacon Hills she knew that much, but how…When had her father gotten back? He’d left Beacon Hills a few years after Claudia died, leaving her, more or less, in Lenara’s care because she refused to leave the place she’d finally learned to call home. He’d been a part of the interim pack, but when Laura came and they’d lost Claudia, he’d lost all hope and left to a territory on the other side of the continent. Of course he came to visit, but he never stayed long.

“What good are you?!” Chris yelled. “Why weren’t you with her?!”

“Dad,” Allison croaked, reaching out for him. “Calm the fuck down.”

His jaw dropped at her tone as she sat up and groaned. Her leg had been wrapped, as had her shoulder. She recognized Melissa’s work and the dull feeling of pain from both. She hadn’t been doped up. Isaac looks like he’s still smarting from the wounds, but had no doubt been sent back with her for the protection detail.

“How long have I been out?” Allison asked.

“Less than an hour,” Isaac said. “Stiles sent you back with the first transport. Said he’d given you first aid for the poison, but you needed to go back.”

Allison nodded, “Have to remember to thank him. How’s Maricopa?”

Isaac shook his head, “Over run. Anyone who was able is being evacuated to Beacon Hills and other territories. Stiles and Erica are still fighting. They’ve gotten some reinforcement, Derek’s gone to help and a good deal of the sentinel, but there’s no telling if there’s enough help.”

She nodded and got up grabbing her vest, “We can’t just sit here.”

Chris stopped her, “You aren’t going anywhere.”

Allison glared at her father, “Don’t make me pull rank.”

His jaw dropped, “I’m your father—”

“I am a member of the Beacon Hills Pack,” she said. “As such I belong out there with them fighting until it’s over in whatever I can. Not licking my wounds, so hand me a gun or move out of my way.”

Chris stared at her, but stepped aside allowing her to march towards the door where Isaac was waiting.

“You bring her back in one piece,” Chris said.

Isaac wondered if he understood his daughter, the situation, or that this was honestly just the beginning.

*

When it’s over, Derek is covered in blood and some damn dizzy with power he remains growling at the retreating forces until Stiles finds him at the edge of the main city. His eyes aren’t glowing red, but that moonlight color of black wolves, his body is vibrating with power and flickering as if he’s going in and out of reality. He’s covered in blood, his clothes sticking to him, matting his hair, dripping from his claws.

“Derek,” Stiles says gently and watches the glow fade to alpha red and then that hazel they are and his eyes focus on Stiles. “Let’s get going.”

No one can explain why dragons withdraw so quickly, why beating back the rest of the monsters happens so fast, why getting people back to Beacon Hills takes so little time. They can only say that they’re alive and more or less, everyone they love is accounted for.

Per Maricopa’s territory leader, a firebird named Qu’ora, they’d lost nearly half the territory in the attack crushed beneath buildings, stolen away, or eaten alive. The Pack is on duty to make rounds, collect information and offer condolence to those who have survived the attack.

It’s after Stiles has gone on patrol and set up new nets over the holes that have appeared, catching them before they were too large. He posts hellhounds, imps, bacchis and anything else that would heed his summons to stand guard outside the territory for incoming threats alongside the sentinel who were already stretched to their limit.

“Derek,” Stiles says as Derek watches the news. He’s put Anai to sleep in the Barracks with Isaac and Allison and taken them off duty so they can heal up.

Dragon and ogres injuries were some of the worst for the supernatural, let alone mortal. They’d done well coming back alive.

“Come with me,” he said. Derek turned off the television and followed Stiles.

He’d ditched the cloak but still wore those gauntlets covered in mystic symbols. He’d suffered a few scrapes and bruises during the attack

“What exactly are those gauntlets for?” Derek asked as they walked through the forest behind the Hale House.

“For?” Stiles asked not looking back.

“Yes, for? Allison told me you killed a dragon… that can’t be low level wiccan magic. The last person to kill a dragon was Claudia Heironim in the last siege.”

Stiles nodded. He knew that. He’d been the reason she’d done it. It had attacked his school, prepared to eat both him and Scott. He stopped in a clearing that Derek remembered from his childhood. It was where Talia had taught all of her children to fight.

“Who are you Stiles?” Derek asked.

Stiles snorted, “I’m Stiles Stilinski. These gauntlets, like my cloak, are warded for protection. They’re battle gear.”

He kneeled etching lines in the loose earth. Derek kneeled.

“It’s the full moon,” Stiles said looking up at the sky. “And with that comes with a special opportunity.”

He looked at him as Stiles placed his hands on either side of the drawing.

“Special?”

Stiles nodded, “The moon calls to all wolves, Dead or alive. And the dead have ways of knowing things that we cannot.”

Derek frowned as Stiles took a deep breath, his voice as light as the light of the moon, yet as solid as the earth. Derek felt it over his sense, the swirl of Lycan words of power and history.

_Bless this circle, Goddess our grace. Be my rite and passage; give voice to those who have joined you so that we still here may hear their wisdom._

The circle lit up, filling with moonlight and Derek could see the design: a triskele… the Hale Family Triskele that had been tattooed on his back days after the fire.

Derek looked across the circle and felt his heart quake. So many faces he only saw in nightmares now, his mother and sister sitting just across the way staring at him, their eyes glowing red.

“Hello,” Talia greeted looking between them. Stiles whose eyes were still shut tight, focusing and channeling the energy.

The words don’t come but his chest burns, his wolf whimpers and he wants to start sobbing seeing them all there.

“We don’t have much time,” Talia said looking at Derek. “The channel on the full moon is only open for so long.”

Derek nodded stiffly and swallowed thickly, “The fire, the chaos afterwards, Laura’s death, Derek… none of it is your fault. Whether by Kate’s hand or the hands of the Council directly, this is how it was meant to be. The power you now have has always been meant for you.”

Laura’s head turned into the distance, the North side.

“The barrier,” Derek choked out. “How do we fix it?”

Talia laughed, “It is not something to be fixed, as Claudia would say, but something to be forged.”

Derek swallowed and she only smiled, “

“I’m proud of you,” Talia said with a wolfish grin. “That was a beautiful disemboweling job on that Council member.”

He can’t help but laugh because of course she approved of it.

“And thank you for reclaiming the title for Hales,” she said with a nod. “And for breaking the record.”

“It’s all love,” he said earning a nod from her.

“It’s all love,” she repeated. “All the time. We are always here for you, Derek. Surprisingly, as a black wolf, you’ve got some tricks up your sleeves.”

His eyebrows drifted up as Talia beamed at him, “Watch the North and East border. The Council means to outflank the territory and overrun it from its weakest side.”

Stiles let out a grunt, his fingers clenching, his mouth moving.

“We’re out of time,” Talia said and looked to Derek. “You and Stiles are the ship and anchor, the shield and sword, sigil and hope. Remember that no matter how dark it becomes.”

“Follow the beacon in the hills?”

She nodded, “Lead by that oath and kick their ass.”

He nodded slowly watching them all flicker, the whispered _Nava’il’to_ makes his heart swell and overflow, burning hot streaks down his cheeks as he sits quietly and slowly Stiles comes out of the trance he’d entered into. 3 Derek says nothing, tears streaming down his cheeks and weeping silently.

Stiles swallows the words he wants to say but reached a hand out to place on Derek’s and squeezes. It’s little comfort, but better than being alone. He isn’t sure how long they sit there in the dirt, but when Derek is ready they head back to the house and Derek sits at the table covered in books, draws a piece of paper, sketches an outline of Beacon Hills territory and begins to draw up plans.

Stiles leaves the Hale House to go to City Hall where Charlie is still working on getting everyone accounted for and contacting other territories on behalf of the refugee families.

“Hey Charlie,” he nodded. She smiled at him.

“Rough day?”

Stiles nodded, “I’m going to be in BHQ, call me if you need anything.”

She nodded and he headed down the hall to the map on the floor and reached for a large piece of plastic. After pining them to lay over one another, he grabbed a dry erase marker, opened one of Lenara’s transcriptions and began to write out the words, to one side. When they’re all present he drags them with magic over the map to appropriate places, careful to draw them properly. Confluence arcs over Helion, condensation dips for the shoreline…termination lines for dragon’s gate, scintillation circles over the vampyr coven, cyclonic lifts and uptakes over the forest and oracle spaces.

At first test, the words light fire breaks, wind roars and eventually it all turns to ash leaving nothing but the map beneath.

He huffs and draws another piece to try again with a different configuration, and again and again until he’s falling asleep from the failures and nowhere closer.

It’s somewhere around five in the morning when his tablet beeps. It’s an email from the library at Atlantis, not Alexandria.

_Dear Stiles,_

_I received your request from a woman in Alexandria. You’re in luck that we have the original as well as the prophecy it was based on. I’ve attached both. Don’t worry about returning them, when you’ve gotten what you needed, you may dismiss them and they will return on their own._

_Good Luck,_

_Soteria Parthenopaeus_

_Head Librarian of the Library of Atlantis_

 Stiles finds himself jolted awake, clicking on the attachments icon and shaking as the two documents appear in two old parchment scrolls.

Charlie comes into the door as he’s skimming through the play.

“Stiles, there’s—”

Hs phone rings and he lifts it to his ear, “Yeah?”

“Legions spotted to the North and East. Where are you? We need people on the front lines.”

Stiles cursed, trying to skim through the scroll faster, “I’m working on the barrier, call my Dad and let him know the ETA, he’s got orders to notify everyone. We need people at every Safe House, get the hospital ready for injured and for the love of the Goddess someone get to the kids and tell them what’s going on.”

“Will do. What about you?”

“Working on the barrier. Get Lenara and Dasha to the front line.”

He hung up soon after as Charlie came further into the room, “Stiles, tell me you have any idea.”

He did finding he passage in the play and comparing it to the prophecy; it was obvious what was going on.

_Where sunlight shall find you and not burn, where silver cannot harm you, where the thirst is quiet--find it here beneath its light…_

Obviously, vampyr, his eyes skimmed further through the lines, there had to be something he was missing.

_For you are not forgotten, those who breathe the eternal blue…_

He frowned skimming glancing between the play’s words, the prophecy and the map and shaking his head. It was insane… absolutely insane to even think but….

But maybe…

Stiles grabbed the cup of water and spilled over the page, grabbed a flowerpot and dumped earth out onto it. He focused drawing magic to his fingertips and dropping pearls of it in the mess. Dragon fire red, solid pixie dust and watched it sprout roots and vines.

“Stiles?” Charlie asked watching him, muttering, his eyes flickering and him grabbing for a marker as the stones kept dripping from his fingertips and he moved them until the map was practically covered. The center of the map which was honestly just a bunch of forest he placed a pure white orb. “What are you…?”

  
He bit his lip and began where the main temple, the original that was now just an empty building, would be, south of the most eastern city, “ _Listen, to what I have seen this day. A glimmering hope, a shining beacon...”_

Moving to the placement of the Beacon Hills sign, “ _A band around us so tight, holds us shoulder to shoulder, in warmth and security and brags the strength of shields unharmed by strife, untouched by time, eternal._ ”

Charlie watched him drawing out the verses in old script. She recognized the Wiccan words but no the configuration he was using, the arcs were foreign and eventually the words made no sense as he read the words out loud and continued to draw.

“Stiles what are you doing?” She asked watching the insanity of sigils and symbols unfold. Druid circles holding faerie script, Wiccan circles holding Lycan words… A triskele drawn in Wiccan words... Each new symbol, each new verse a mockery of the structure of magic as it was taught and a Hegelic application of magic. She shook her head, he’d lost his mind.

“ _May we forgive our debts and settle our scores. Bury our hatchets here and come together to honor these words made real and see ourselves reflected back to us in our dreams made real,”_ he whispered etching wiccan words in pixie language in the town square over other symbol that were already there.

His heart hammered in his chest as he continued, sure and measured glyphs as he spoke. Lycan words in condensation arc, cyclonic Druid scripts, more and more until all magics were compounded two or three times over. It was absolutely insane, the interference, the opposition, the contention would destroy it but he kept going. It had to work, it had to work, there was nothing else. That was what the prophecy spoke of, the words of the play only expounded on the idea, made it clear, gave it clear intention, incantation: actionable magic.

Charlie swallowed feeling that the speech was nearing the end, the sound of the phone ringing, she answered to tell Derek that she was in City Hall that she didn’t know what was going on, that Stiles was drawing on a map and doing something insane.

“ _It is here we stand. Against the enemy, we contend. We take their weapons to brandish our shields anew. For as long as they rise—“_

 _“_ Charlie!” Derek called leading a host of children into the conference room including Anai. Charlie turned calling down the hall.

“ _We will rise to meet them.—“_

Derek came down the hall as Charlie turned.

“ _For as long as we are here,—“_

“Charlie, I need you to stay here with them, more children from the schools are on their way.”

“ _We will hold the shield-wall—_ ”

“Of course, I just—”

“ _For as long as we hold this oath true—”_

 _“_ What is it?” Derek asked urgently, “They’ll be on us in less than five minutes. They’re using some sort of portal jumping and are already beating at the North Barrier line. Where is Stiles?”

“That’s what I’m saying, I—”

“ _We are the beacon anew!_ ”

Derek frowned feeling the surging as Charlie turned and they felt the shockwave, the crackling of lightning and power. Fire and water surged, wind, and earth moved, filling the room with magic and moving the books and loose pages as it swirled together. Stiles stood over the map watching the symbols fill with light, swirling words that shifted and twitched in place before moving, floating over the sheet a beam of light shooting up from the glowing white orb in the center. The light poured out into a brilliant blue dome over, falling to the edges of the territory line, following every edge and dip, across the shoreline, harmonizing with the other magic stones.

Derek’s eye widened as did Charlie, the children who’d been led in peaked around the corner. As it stabilized, glowing that solid blue the barrier had glowed the day it went up, stronger bright. Derek walked in staring at the barrier and the mess on the floor before reaching out to touch it, it felt just like passing through the barrier, but smaller.

Stiles let out a shriek, “It worked!”

The explosion in the distance is enough to get their attention before Derek looked at Stiles.

“Can you make this bigger?”

“We’ll see,” Stiles said. “Meet me at Lenara’s in ten.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) Dear elder, with who we have entered an agreement for peace and friendship, this one come to propose a common meeting location on the border of our territories so that we may come together on peaceful ground.  
> 2)Anchors and seals for the survivor who lives after. It's a standard base for Wiccan post-exorcism seals. The actual seals are non-standard.   
> 3) Always together as one. Refers to always being a part of a Pack as a phrase, as a noun it refers to mates.  
> * Yes, Mikhaira was mostly inspired by Ruby from RWBY.   
> **General note, emissary territory stay programs are non-standard but designed by the territories that host them. They submit them to their schools and the schools decide how the stay will be counted. As such a good territory has the potential to knock off whole classes from an emissary's course of study. Stiles designed it so that successful completion would be equivalent to a semester's worth of classes and free people up for independent study. The kids aren't really aware of that though and won't be until they return to school.


	17. The Creed of Heironim and Hale

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fuck the Council.
> 
> Council: 0 Beacon Hills: Over 3 million and counting

Stiles goes flying through window with a scroll tucked in his pants pocket, leaving the miniature Beacon Hills barrier still burning. Charlie allows the kids to come in and marvel at it while Derek kisses Anai’s head and runs out the door down the street towards Lenara’s house, telling everyone he sees to get to City Hall or some other structure that’s been magically fortified for disaster. He lands running front of his house to run into his father getting dressed for war. Their eyes meet and Stiles finds himself hugging his Dad and being squeezed back.

“You come back, you understand?” Nikodem said, kissing his temple and stroking his hair. “I can’t lose both of you to those bastards.”

“Wear your cloak?” Stiles pleads.

Nikodem nods, lifting it from the chair. It bears the crest of the Stilinski family in silver over a deep blue. Stiles remembers Claudia threading spell through it when he was a kid and can see them still there.

“Come back, Dad,” Stiles said. “I can’t lose both of you to those bastards either.”

He snorts, “Fuck the Council.”

Stiles nodded and turned to the living room as Nikodem left the house to get into the Jeep. Apparently, in times of war bygones could be bygones.

_Bury our hatchets here…_

Stiles lifts his hand towards the mantle, drawing the staff that rests there to his hand. It’s short, almost gnarled, the gem is dim, but at his touch it glows, growing brighter and the staff grows longer, twining and twisting into itself as it grows. His mother’s cloak floats up the stairs and fastens itself around his neck. His gauntlets appear and wrap around his forearms. Stiles takes a breath and turns to walk out the door and take off into the sky, cloak billowing behind him.

People stop in the street to look up as he shoots across the sky towards Lenara’s house. Lenara and Dasha are heading out to climb on to the outbound Jeep towards the North line. Derek skids to a stop in front to wish them luck.

“You just worry about that barrier,” Dasha says with a demonic gleam in her eye. “This isn’t the first time we’ve been up against these fuckers.”

It’s the first time, he’s heard Dasha sound so violent and Lenara grins at him, “Poker face, alpha.”

He nodded, “Steady heart.”

The jeep goes tearing through town towards the North territory line and through the sky he can see Stiles rushing towards him. With that red cloak around his shoulders, strapped across his chest, wearing all black, and bearing a staff Derek thinks he’s a ghost, but shakes that thought away.

“Where are we going?” Derek asked.

Stiles landed and drew a circle through the air with the tip of his staff. It expanded and Derek followed him through it into the forest. Before them a great doorway, grown over with vines and darkness. It looks as though no one should trespass there and Derek can only hope that Stiles isn’t leading him somewhere insane.

When Stiles walks into the darkness, Derek follows him and finds that even his sense give him no help. Stiles’s staff is the only source of light in the tunnel but extends no farther than the two of them.

“Stay close,” Stiles tells him. “We’re passing through a rift.”

Derek shivers. He doesn’t know what it is, but knows that a rift in anything isn’t a good thing. There’s something to his left, whispering, screaming, he hears it but he tries to push it out of his mind. Stiles grabs his hand and squeezes.

“Trust me,” he said and Derek closes his eyes, blotting out everything else but Stiles’s heartbeat.

*

Scott and Kira find themselves stationed in front of the North Safe House as the first line of defense, watching the legions pouring over the hills towards them, the creatures already pounding at the barrier and the magic eaters nibbling at the holes.

Dragons screech in the distance and they wonder if everything that has ever hated them got the memo. More people are arriving to back them up but if the barrier fell, they’d be out numbered. The sentinels set up magic canons in the distance with Boyd directing them. Erica is commanding further down the line, on the East side backed by half of Stiles’s demonic summons.

Jackson’s stomach turns at the sight of the Erlkings, clamoring towards them along with the other dark faeries sloughing through the distance towards them. Redkaps, manitcore, chimera, griffins…

“Gods help us,” Alexandros whispered, swallowing thickly as he drew his sword. “Does everyone want to eat you?”

“Pretty much,” Boyd said. “Don’t worry. If things get dicey, you run straight back to town, you understand?”

Alexandros snorted, lightning his sword with a whistle across the blade, “I was born in Athens, at the hell gate. I have seen worse.”

Boyd snorted, the Grecian would fit right in if he chose to stay. If they all made it through this alive… To think it was barely seven in the morning and already the world was ending.

Erica called the archers forward, the canons behind and stood in line before looking at the triplets who gazed in horror and terror at the creatures clawing at the barrier. It would be a hell of a fight, but the groundlings Allison and the other could take care of either. It was her job to man the big guns and keep the dragons at bay.

“We give them hell here!” She yelled. “Nothing gets through! This mafia does not let an invasion go lightly!”

The men let out a yell in agreement, lifted their weapons. Chimera roared running into the barrier, making it crack and ripple.

“You hold until it breaks! Then you shoot those fuckers out of the sky!”

“Shouldn’t we be back at the city?” Emma asked nervously. “I mean… we’re not even twenty-five yet.”

Erica whirled on them, “Wake the fuck up. Does it look like they give a damn how old you are? You followed me out here, so stay and fight or go the fuck back.”

Evelyn growled, “A Reyes doesn’t run.”

“Then shut the fuck up and fall in,” Erica growled at her and walked on down the line to climb on top of a jeep so she could be heard. As she’d told them, it was empty making it an isolated target. Stiles told her that dragon fire was mostly magic and very near to demon fire. He’d been helping her absorb and redirect all sorts of magic fire and now she had to test it.

 _Dragons will be attracted to you because you’ll appear as the largest threat,_ he’d said, drawing sigils into her clothing. _Draw their attention and take them for everything they’ve got. You steal a dragon’s fire, it’s half way dead._

In distance, they heard gun fire. Erica made herself stay still knowing that it was near Boyd’s section of the line. Isaac was stationed further East, past Allison’s battalion. The other sections of the territory were being led by the forces of the nearest cities.

When the chimera breaks through, canons burst into fire. A griffin breaks through nearby and in between a manticore. She growls and watches the hellhounds ascend to tear into the incoming. Erica hurls fire through the holes, screaming with effort and pushing the heat until they burst into a balance.

“On my mark!” She called out waiting as it flew up and prepared to attack.

“Hold!”

Its wings beat and she held its gaze waiting for the moments it would come.

“Hold!”

She heard their hearts hammering; the triplets were no better shaking in line, waiting for the lower barrier to be broken and the foot soldiers to come swarming in.

“Hold!”

It screeched and dove, opening it’s mouth to let out a blast. Erica opens her palms to catch it, drawing it in and screaming at the intensity as it comes crashing in and flying towards her.

It’s mouth catches the jeep she’s on beneath the tires and above her head still blasting her with fire. Her jacket and jeans begin to burn away, the enchantments fading from the intensity as she forces herself to take it, to absorb the power, even though it hurts, even though it burns and she swears she’s going to be burnt to death. She’s screaming.

The triplets stare at the mouth opened around Erica, blasting her and melting the jeep beneath her feet. Hears her screaming and knows that she’s being heard down the line, knows that she’s dead. They move to run because they’re no match for a dragon. When the flame stops, she’s there, standing in its mouth as the jeep’ turns to ash beneath her feet. Her hair is singed short, a fire streaked cloud of riotous curls, her eyes glows with fire and darkness.

“FIRE!” She yelled and they did anywhere they could hit while Erica pushed at the dragon’s jaws, pushing beyond her reach with concentrated magic until she heard the jaw snap and further until its lower jaw went falling to the ground with a loud thud.

It screeched from its throat drawing back, but it was too damn late as she grabbed its tongue and yanked it free until blood came gushing out and driving her fist through the roof of its mouth and releasing a burst of fire. The body jerked and crashed to the ground with her, leaking blood and charred cerebral fluid. Erica rose and marched over the shoulder of dragon, hair short and flickering like flame, eyes bright glowing through mess of dragon blood over her face.

“Pixies are still not for fucking sale!”

The battalion let out a rallying yell. The triplets stared, as the wind blew rustling the remains of her clothes as she stared down the legions beyond the barrier who stared at her and seemed to rethink their decision. The triplets are already half way back to the city—the cowards.

“Don’t run now,” Erica laughed. “We’re just getting started!”

*

Stiles turned down the next corridor before reaching a large glowing room. He let out a sound. It could never be fucking easy could it?

“What is it?” Derek asked.

“Get down,” Stiles said, listening to the slithering darkness and feeling the presences rising in the room.

Derek kneeled at his side, not sure why but waited. He couldn’t hear anything, but he felt something. Stiles stuck his staff into the ground and walked forward.

“Don’t move,” he said stepping forward.

Derek swallowed watching him disappear into the darkness. It’s nearly impenetrable until a beam of light grows from about where he’d seen Stiles walk to. It smells like pure magic and moves so fast that Derek only hears the whistling of the wind around Stiles’s cloak and the sound of it colliding against something in the darkness. What Stiles could possibly be fighting, he had no idea, but the fact that he was so good at fighting it was telling. He smells blood, foul and thick as if it was from something already dead and hears a growl. The blade moves again, faster and faster the smell of blood gets thicker in the air and the smell of the cave begins to emerge. It smells old, older than anything Derek has ever encountered.

“ _You will never be rid of me, Stiles._ ”

He freezes at the voice and smells the shift in something that he can’t place. It makes his wolf uncomfortable, like pure chaos and darkness.

To Stiles it smells like tar and black licorice, and even in the darkness he knows that sound, that voice.

_Everyone has it…_

_But no one can lose it…_

A past, he thinks. A shadow.

He moves, slicing through the air as another presence joins him in the dark, both of them attacking him from either side. He holds the incantation firmly in his mind against the sound. He hated rifts for a reason, the demons knew him well, got a taste and scent of him and remembered forever. He had to close it somehow, get them through it…

 _Kill it,_ his mind supplied.

 _A rift maker,_ Stiles realized, spinning out of the way and pinning the body to the wall with the blade of magic before conjuring another to pin the second to the ceiling.

He draws the sigil through the air quickly between the two stakes of light.

“Vade, et inde huc transmeare. Clausa sunt termini inter mundum et pax!” 1

Derek wasn’t sure what the hell happened but in a swirl of wind and magic, the darkness lifted and all was a bright glowing grotto. The middle of it a large lake of pure light and around it all manner of foliage, growing. Flowers he’d never seen before drifted over the top of the surface.

Stiles returns to Derek and pulls his staff from the ground before walking forward.

“Stiles—”

Derek’s voice dies in his throat as Stiles walked across the solid surface.

“Come on,” Stiles said leading the way. Looking now, Derek could see the shapes in the water, solid and transparent. The pool seemed to have no ending and no depth and the surface was completely still. When Stiles stopped, Derek looked down where he was looking.

Claudia’s staff and ten claws… He bet they’d been Talia’s… How had they gotten here?

“Take this,” Stiles said giving him the scroll and kneeling in the center. There was a ripple and Stiles’s eyes began to glow the same bright cyan as the pool. His staff as well in his hands.

Derek swallowed and looked at the words on the page, “Stiles I can’t read this.”

“The words will come, read them when they do,” Stiles promised taking a breath and closing his eyes, picturing Beacon Hills, feeling the borders in his blood, borders that were now being overrun, the rush of power and presence over the territory, everyone and everything that belonged to the territory in him.

Derek watched glyphs begin to appear on Stiles’s skin, glowing cyan and resonating with the pool as the glyphs began to form in the pool as well. They drifted over his skin, up his staff, over his cheeks and into his eyes.

When Stiles begins to recite the words, he feels the power of the words rushing around him, expanding beyond the pool, beyond him. He sees the hospital filling with people, sees the front lines where the Pack fights with everything they have. He sees Erica covered in dragon blood, her hair burnt short. Allison and Ayr cutting through the onslaught of ground forces as wounded are dragged back and carted off towards the nearest hospital or med bay. He sees Mikhaira and Marq fighting, Rosalina, Alexandros, fighting.

So when the words on the scroll begin to appear Derek reads them, images of his territory, his people, his _family_ fighting for the place the call home.

_Find sanctuary with us. Find Asylum with us. Find peace and acceptance here with us. For we will be your beacon, glimmering in the night when hope is lost and the way is dark._

He sees Lenara and the man she’d stood with in the picture fighting thick blasts of pure angel light flying through the legions, scorching paths. He notices that the man is wearing Dasha’s clothing and has that demonic gleam in his eyes. Lydia is there, still managing to look so put together even as she screeches at a band of ghouls until their heads explode.

_For we will raise our shield, together in front and back, on all sides, when the scales turn gold and mark the darkness falling rises._

He sees Nikodem leading a small group of men against  a band of orc who growl and hiss at them, charging them. He sees them fire guns and swing swords. He sees Nikodem casting a spell along the edge of his sword and slicing through an orc. Raven Pendragon casts a thick barrier around herself and screams as the orc pounds on it. Nikodem turns back to save her and order her to go back the city if she won’t fight.

_With the silver moon’s riding and the golden sun’s light, we stand in defense of this beacon we have created, roaring all the stars alight to brighten the darkest night._

He sees the dark clouds advancing, a great curse being worked in the distance and rushing towards them. In it comes nightmares and pain, revenge. He sees the vehicles of poachers eyeing his pack and other members of the force. Even as Vlad is a sleek white blur tearing through enemy line and growling at Aurora who has gone into full shock behind him. He’s defending her and nine others against the onslaught.

_May we unite beneath the Beacon and show you the way against the mist a_ _nd shadows of those who wear the mask of truth, whose eyes glint mischief and deceit._

Derek sees the Council member in the distance ordering the attack, bidding his time and the dragons who fly from the mountains, a great number of them drawn to the scent of magic and Beacon Hills’s barrier crumbling. The last bits of it crumbling. He feels his senses expanding through the forest, his wolf running and howling along the border, crying out that this was his territory and he would be damned if it would fall.

He hears Isaac and Rosalina returning the howl, slashing through all that come towards them. Rosalina shifts into a grey and tawny wolf, leaving her clothes behind and sinking her teeth and claws into the neck of an ogre along with the hellhounds who follow her lead. Isaac drags his claws through a trolls gut, tearing flesh apart and yanks its insides out until it falls dead.

He sees the tiny golden dragon baby crawling around her playpen, her parents standing at the front and back door of the safe house, members of their band all around it and waiting, listening to the sounds of war heading their way. But they don’t move from their posts, they are the child’s last defense after all.

He sees when the poachers begin to make their move on the West and South border, wiggling through the holes that are opening up and fighting with the sentinel force there. The hellhounds are relentless, but they exorcise them in time. The sentinels hold them mostly at bay but some make it past their defensive line running and driving deeper into Beacon Hills in search of bounty.

*

“Fall back!” Nikodem yells firing a last shot before falling back into the forest where they have an ambush set up.  He grabs Raven by the arm and drags her back past the forest line. When they pass the safety line and the forces that followed swarm after, faerie light comes raining down from the sky, blinding the forces, scorching some, shocking others. Jackson falls from the sky, calling water and pure force to choke the first of them, drowning him where he stands.

Scott is just behind him, razor sharp thorns curling up from the ground and impaling orcs and ogres alike. Dark burst of pixie dust twined with faerie light exploding through the air, unraveling the reality of the forces. It’s pure guerilla warfare, leading them into the trees to be cut down.

Kira shoot lightning bolts from her fingers, whipping it out from the edge of her sword as they’re pressed back towards the North Safe House. They hear the second line getting ready and dive aside as the were-dragon band blasts whatever brand of magic they have at the forces coming at them. Ogres push through the line almost ignorant of the blasts until from the dark circles in front of the line, hellhounds rise and run forward, called forward by black scaled members of the band.

It almost feels as though they’ll win until a trumpet sounds in the distance and they see the dark cloud in the distance and the dragons heading up the rear.

“Reform the line!” Kira calls over the noise.

In City Hall, Charlie has closed all the windows and doors, activated the buildings’ defenses and have let the kids amuse themselves with the tiny barrier that is still active. They use it as a marker of where is safe when they play tag. The adults sit, shuddering and praying in various rooms. She takes a peak towards the North and east border and sees the darkness growing in the distance. She offers a mental prayer and smiles before joining the kids in a game of tag.

 _Poker face and steady heart_ , she reminded herself glancing to the large painting of Talia and Claudia after their first dragon kill that hung at the end of the hallway. They’re grinning at the viewer, Claudia’s staff lodged in the dragon’s eye, Talia’s claws covered in blood and positively gleeful despite the blood on their clothes. It had been such a great moment… a moment that became a hallmark in the history of Beacon Hills.

The official Pack picture that was taken a month or so before Aurora came was much of the same. They’d been traveling through the Hostiles from a visit to Los Angeles and had ended up losing the car and hiking back, fighting their way back and taking their picture in front of the Beacon Hills sign.

“When you lose your way,” Charlie said softly. “Follow the beacon in the hills.”

*

Derek wasn’t sure how much more he could take. With each line, the force grew larger, condensing itself as if preparing to explode over them. Stiles was bearing the brunt of it, his nose was bleeding glowing liquid, thick rivulets of light coming from his eyes, mouth and ears. He sounded as if he was screaming to his own ears, in pain and stress. His wolf howling as the magic rushed through him. Stiles was definitely screaming the final lines, roaring as cyan light burst from his staff, his mouth and eyes.

“ _For as long as we hold this oath true, we are the beacon anew._ ”

The symbols floating beneath them trembled, vibrated and there was the crackle of electricity before the force vanished from his chest and Derek swooned, falling to his knees as the pool beneath them pulsed. He watched the symbols explode outward rushing out to the walls around them, across the ground. The light coming from Stiles shot straight into the sky, leaving the grotto like a spirit and expanding out over the territory.

*

Though Lenara and the man Lydia can only assume is Dasha are brilliant at fighting, they need more help. They needed back up, she takes a deep breath, ready, truly ready, to push the extent of her Banshee powers. She’d never done it before, but she’d never had a desperate need for back up before either.

 _Jackson Whittemore_ someone whispers in her ear, _dark blade._

She feels it in her soul when the knife sinks home and, all at once, she only sees him. His laughing face, his terrified face with flickering faerie light, the lightness, his face in the morning all-spiraling away into a darkness that only whispered to her in a chorus of voices that  held no warmth for her.

_Jackson…_

She opens her mouth and screams from beyond herself. Everything going dark as she does so.

They heard Lydia’s scream ringing through the air: mournful and full of rage before a very different darkness erupted around where she’d been stationed. Scott pushed hard, twinining poisonous vines around the orcs’ feet and telling Jackson to fall back.

“Oh shit,” Kira said watching ghostly images appear.

The scream continued to echo across the territory drawing attention and terror even from the legions who seemed to be unable to be deterred. Hundreds of thousands of people who’d lost their lives and had never been properly put to rest. The majority of them predated Beacon Hills which meant they were old, vengeful druid spirits who’d been cut down in the lives too early, faeries, and pixies who’d been eaten alive by the legions of the Hostiles….

 “Jackson!” Scott yelled as the boy, drowned another orc and choked on the blade in his side. He fell back into Scott’s arms who dragged him back behind the dragon’s line.

As they do, formless figures of darkness appear around them and swarm the orcs, snatching their souls and leaving them dead in front of them. She’d done it, Kira realized… Lydia had actually called up the Legions of the Lost…

“Go Lydia!” Erica cheers watching the dark figures swarming, leaving the legions breathless and giving the mortal forces a reprieve to drag their wounded back behind the fire line.

Lenara watches the spirit swarm, but it’s Dasha who rushes to Lydia. Her hair white, her eyes fully black, her mouth open in an abyss scream that seems to have no end. If she stayed that way too long, she would become one of the Lost and what good what that do any of them.

“Lydia,” Dasha said, bringing magic to his fingertips and touching her shoulder, searching for her beneath the shock and terror.

_Lydia._

_Jackson! Jackson!_ He heard and swallowed, taking hold of her mind and probing. The image of Jackson, whisper and the shock all swarm and disperse to where Lydia is sobbing, curled up and rocking. Her hair frazzled.

 _There is still time,_ he tells her. _But if you stay like this, there won’t be._

He showed her were Kira and Scott were with Jackson. Scott had pulled the blade free, shoved candy in his and Jackson’s mouth. Kira continued to feed him as he began pumping pixie dust into him at the source of Jackson’s injury, trying to contain the darkness from spreading. It’s slowed considerably, but not stopped. There’s time.

_“Hold on Jackson, we’ll get you to the hospital. Don’t you leave yet! We have other bakeries to go to! We have sweets to try!”_

_Jackson coughed and winced, “I’m fine… I’ll be alright.”_

_“Yeah, after we get you to a hospital. Eat!”_

The images scatter, the darkness recedes and Lydia’s eyes regain their consciousness. Her mouth closes the scream stops and the spirit all vanish at once. She looks at Dasha who nods at her.

“There is still time,” he repeats.

Lydia nods shakily, turning back to where the line has been pushed back before running forward to reset the line. She can still hear his name being whispered in her head, it wasn’t until they stopped whispering when it was too late. Of the hundreds of people being whispered about right now, none of them had faded into silence and that was enough…

So she ran headlong into battle to keep the horde at bay for as long as they had to.

Scott pressed his glowing hands against Jackson’s wound as the truck pulls up to take them to the hospital. There’s something in the ground, a glowing cyan streak, rushing out towards the front line that he can see, traveling the ley lines out towards the edge of the territory. He really hopes it’s back up because he knows everyone is careening towards the end of their powers.

Nikodem loses his sword and manages to dodge, but falls to the ground. He moves but he knows he isn’t fast enough to avoid the orc’s blade. He’s going to lose that arm. He rolls and shuts his eyes for the pain only to find that it doesn’t come.

When he opens his eyes the orc’s arm is on the ground, the orc’s body has fallen dead and the legions behind it are falling dead as well, though the members of Beacon Hills do not. Everyone stares in wonder until the light shoots up arcing over their heads as a line of scrambled words and joins the rising wall above their heads. Magic ripples back over the edges of the dome as a new layer of light and the earth shakes.

Erica watches the ripple come down, feels the earth shake and the way that the legions burst into nothingness as they come into contact with the shield.

*

Derek watched the burst of magic die down and sees the blue filter in the sky. The barrier is back.

“Stiles…” he breathes seeing him, his eyes still glowing cyan, light still leaking out of him and into his clothes. His staff still beaming.

In the next moment, they’re in the middle of the hospital and Stiles falls over, floating in the air, pulses of light radiating out of him, his eyes still open and glowing, light leaking out of him as he stares into nothing.

Melissa finds them in the foyer, Derek looking at Stiles floating in the air and then to Melissa.

“What?”

*

He feels nothing honestly, but he smells magic and hospital as he opens his eyes and he pulls himself into consciousness. It feels a bit like he’s been possessed, but not quite. The taste of tar and black licorice isn’t there and there’s an odd fullness in his mind where there used to be emptiness…

“You’re a lot thinner than I remember,” a voice rumbled. “Joachim.”

Stiles turned his head to see Derek sitting at his bedside smiling.

Derek… tiny black wolf Derek. Flying stead… rejecter—hell, _bath_ time and naps. God, how did he forget all of that. Logically he knew that he and Derek had to have spent some time together given who their parents were but… he hadn’t guessed _that_ much time. Oh god, he even remembered how big of a crush he’d had on Derek before he’d started dating Paige. He’s almost mortified… Derek had been his very first masturbation fantasy… a frequent on next to unnamed faces before the possession.

Derek on the other hand is delighting in the return of memories. He finally understands what it was that was missing in Stiles’s scent: his magic. He smelled like Claudia a bit, enough to know that they were related, apparently enough to break whatever seal was on his memories. But it was something all Stiles, all chaos and order that completed Stiles’s scent profile and made him think of long nights chatting about their parents, about Beacon Hills, about the lives they lead as Stiles Stilinski and Derek Hale. He also remembers that Stiles was too young, their lives in too much chaos, for anything beyond their secret friendship no matter how much his wolf wanted him.

 _Anchor_ , Derek thought it was ironic. Even without his memory, Stiles was his anchor. His mother did always say that the wolf remembered far more than the human did. He knows why Stiles smells so good to him now too, understands why he smells so much better now too. He always smelled good, but now that he was older it was more than just comfort, but arousal, love, and affection to. A piece of his past he’d thought was dead, but here now, breathing, alive.

It’s the kind of relief that can’t be expressed in words. Everyone isn’t dead.

“Uhm…”

“Is this part where I can safely assume that you made that arrest in Texas… _Miss_ Heironim?”

Stiles blushed, “Shut up, sour wolf.”

Derek tossed his head back and laughed before getting up and hugging Stiles tightly, nuzzling him and sinking his scent into his skin. Stiles groaned.

“ _Get off_ , before you make me all wolfy.”

Derek growled at him and took an odd sense of satisfaction in the way Stiles bared his neck and whimpered in his arms, allowing him to rub his scent there to his satisfaction. It’s a heady, purely lycan feeling as he nips at his neck just somewhere in between playful and possessive. Stiles whines, a small sound before Derek grins. When he pulled back, he pressed a kiss between Stiles’s eyebrows and guided him to lay back down.

“Lenara says you had too strong of a dose of magic, whatever you were doing.”

He snorted and nodded, it would explain somethings. His ley lines felt clearer, both sets, as if channeling all that magic, pouring all the saved magic he had, into the barrier, giving it just a little bit more of a kick to help end the battle had completely cleared them of whatever remaining hold the possession had had on him… like a weird magic flush or something.

Who knew, he may actually sleep more now.

Derek also informed him that while he was unconscious, he healed several thousand people simply by floating in the same room as them, purified Jackson of some sort of dark blade that was corrupting his faerie light, produced several buckets of liquid magic which the hospital staff was very thankful for and rebuild the barrier.

“How long have I been out?”

Derek grinned, “Two weeks.”

Stiles groaned, “Don’t worry. Lenara has been running the emissaries into the ground with training, at least seventy percent of them.”

He nodded. The seventy percent who either didn’t carry their weight or got in the way were on major repair duty. The six who’d been invaluable in the fight were currently shadowing the Pack or off pursuing their interests in Beacon Hills. Mikhaira had been training with Allison in Stiles’s absence. Ayr was studying at the university on barriers; Marq had entered into a temporary apprenticeship with a Wiccan who lived behind the Dragon’s Gate to learn to control his dragon healing abilities better. Vlad and Alexandros were shadowing Isaac and Scott as Jackson was still off duty and recuperating. Rosalina has been hanging out with Anai and Derek half-way educating Derek on Lycan culture and being educated about being treated like a person and not just a dynamic. She’d been staying at the Hale House, keeping an eye on Anai and generally enjoying being a person.

“Getting all the Lycan bonding in are you?” Stiles grinned, “That’s good.”

A soft knock sounded on the door, “Come in.”

Anai poked her head in, “Can we come in now?”

Derek laughed as Stiles grinned extending his arms and making grabby hands at Anai.

“Yes, favorite child, come. Stiles need Anai hugs.”

She giggled and rushed forward to pull herself on to the hospital bed with a little help from Derek and Stiles until she could wrap her arms around his neck. Derek looked at Rosalina who looked a bit bashful.

“She was worried,” she said in apology.

Derek shook his head, “It’s fine, Rosalina. I figured you two would make it here soon.”

Stiles rumbled at Anai and nuzzled her and made Derek’s wolf rumble in content and the man feel warm.

 _Family_ , his heart said. _Love._

They had a lot more to talk about, but that could wait until Stiles was up and moving around again.

When Stiles does get a clean bill of health, he teaches Anai how to sign her name with magic and takes custody of him for the next week. It basically boils down to a lot of Stiles, Anai and Rosalina time in City Hall while Stiles convinces Derek that he is “perfectly fine to continue working”.

He speaks with Rosalina about her studies, what she’s interested in pursuing and finds that she has no desire to be an emissary of a territory. Her parents, the lord and lady Ochoa, made her go to emissary school in hopes that she would be of some use to the territory in the future.

“I’m the only omega in my family,” she confided.

Stiles nodded, took her to lunch with Anai and told her that there was always a place here for her.

Anai watches him like a hawk for any sign of strenuous activity for the week as they get through whatever paperwork has come in and any and all press release information that has not yet gone out and still needs to. There are of course questions about the influx of people into the territory. The new alliances that are forged with Beacon Hills with nearby territories including Maricopa who thanks them profusely for their aid during the crisis and several other places that Beacon Hills lended aid to, including Mikhaira’s home territory in southern Oregon in the form of food and weaponry. The Mob Leader, Miss Cathlyn Sprinter thanks them and it’s then that they realize that Cathlyn is Mikhaira’s mother. Surprisingly, it wasn’t the generally spritely personality that gave her away, but her weapon: a spring-loaded scythe bearing the same crest as Mikhaira’s scythe. Seeing her wield it left no doubt as their styles were incredibly similar.

Apparently, it was a family thing and Cathlyn would be entering negotiations with Derek for an Alliance. Madrid staunchly refused any help, as did many of the other territories that were attacked and were the homes of their emissaries in training. Ayr visited home to make sure everything was all right before returning to continue her studies. Her territory welcomed her and her mother promptly told her to go back to Beacon Hills where it was safe.

The elves of Nevada were a rugged bunch, much different than the elves of the forests and jungles and had their own methods of protecting themselves. She told them that she’d bring back something that meant they could have a place to call their own.

The territory has a huge celebration once everyone is officially given a clean bill of health complete with alcohol, music, games, and general revelry. Stiles can honestly say the last time he’d partied that hard was with an elvish clan in Delhi. He’d had to fight orcs the day after and though the headache was a bitch, he’d still managed to kick some serious ass.

Somehow, after everyone was done being hung over or danced-out, Derek manages to snag Stiles for a secluded lunch to talk about the lives they’ve led since the last time they remembered each other. Stiles remembers that Derek left soon after the Hale Fire and hadn’t been in territory when the barrier was first put up.

Life in New York was “cold, miserable, and perfect” for how Derek felt. He didn’t speak to anyone for a whole year and it took a long time to manage more than a few word sentences.

Losing Claudia had had a similar effect on Stiles. His health declined, his mental health, everything. His relationship with his father and just the dark he’d been spiraling down into made him the perfect place for the Nogitsune to sink his claws into.

The more they talked, the more they remembered the days of harmless teasing and movie marathons at the Hale House. It was so very important that there was little to no scent of the Hales being in the Stilinski house. It would have brought far too many suspicions to be silenced.

For old time’s sake, they get on the floor surrounded by a ridiculous number of pillows, pop a ridiculous amount of popcorn of the savory and buttery variety and watch the Underworld Series, laughing through most of it before falling asleep in the middle of the third one. To Derek it feels like he’s come home and to Stiles like a bit of normalcy.

*

_His hands work slowly drawing clothing over his head, revealing pale skin inch by inch and he sinks to his knees to kiss the softness of his side, lick a path between the moles he can reach, and pull the younger’s pants and underwear over his hips until he’s naked._

_Stiles shivers, his muscles tense, and a gasp escapes him at the rough drag of Derek’s tongue and the softness of his scruff against him. If he’d had sense enough to speak, he would have teased him about the softness, or maybe asked him to hurry up, but he doesn’t. His ley lines are so drunk on Lycan magic that he can only whine and not squirm just as Derek told him to. His eyes glow an answering amber to the blood red Derek’s currently burn in the night._

_Derek stands and capture his lips, walking forward, walking Stiles back towards his bed. He wants to take his time marking him in all the ways that he’s wanted to for years. He takes and handfuls of Stiles’s ass and lifts him up to settle him against the hard edge of cock. Stiles wraps his arms around his neck and whines, low and needy, nuzzling him, pleading without words._

_Derek nips at his shoulder. Not yet. He doesn’t want to fuck him yet. He growls that in Stiles’s ear. Tells him that when he’ll get Derek’s cock when he’s ready to give it to him and not a moment before and if he’s good he’ll fuck his mouth like he likes._

_Stiles lets out a desperate plea and a yelp when Derek drops him on the bed and orders him to turn over and present himself to him. It’s insane, a sort of Lycan instinct that Stiles can’t be expected to have, but his wolf growls with satisfaction when the flush spreads over Stiles’s face and neck, his chest and shoulders as he turns over and does as he’s told. Shaking with embarrassment and the need to please Derek. It makes Derek’s wolf preen that it isn’t just a response born of the odd effect his alpha and black wolf powers have on Stiles, but love and care and just a need to please._

_He’s beautiful in the low light, almost glowing. At the first taste of his skin, Derek groans and Stiles’s breath hitches above him. He takes a slow lingering lick over the curve of his ass and to the small of his back before pressing hand  between Stiles’s shoulder blades._

_He keens, magic pouring directing into the seals and making him sink deeper into Lycan instinct. His back arches and he only moans and whines as Derek begins to lick him, making him wet and forcing his tongue deeper. Stiles jerks at the intrusion, but Derek holds him still, sinking his tongue deeper and deeper until it as far as it will go before pulling out and starting again. He wants him wet, sloppy wet so when Derek decides to slide into him it’s seamless. He already knows that his wolf won’t be patient any longer than it take to get into Stiles so it’s better to prep him thoroughly with tongue and fingers before that time comes._

_Besides, Stiles smells so good there. Like sweat and warmth, home, hearth, Pack and need. Stiles is thrashing against him, his hips stuttering for an orgasm that caught him by surprise by the time Derek is satisfied with how easily he takes his fingers._

_He hushes Stiles’s whimpering as he pulls his pants off and reaches for the bottle of lube Lenara had given him just before her premonitions had started. He had no doubt that he’d need more before the end of the month, even if he had to resort of fucking Stiles in obscure places in City Hall._

_Once he’s lubed and Stiles’s keening has turned into needy growling, Derek places a hand at the center of Stiles’s back to keep his back arched and ass in the air, before directing the end of his cock into Stiles and sliding in until his hips meet Stiles’s ass in one smooth thrust._

_Stiles cries out and scrambles for some reprieve. Derek grins, wrapping his hand around the curve of Stiles’s hip, curvy, Polish, full and delectable. His other hand wrapped around the back of Stiles’s neck to hold him still. Stiles’s insides clench as his body adjusts and realizes that Derek had no intention of letting him go._

_Derek was going to fuck him like an alpha and Stiles was going to take it like a very good beta and if he was good he’d get a taste. There was nothing beyond that no matter how Stiles squirmed at every rough thrust and begged for a reprieve, to touch. Derek growled at him, telling him that he would come from his cock and that was all before slapping he curve of his ass to accentuate his point._

_Stiles’s screamed the first time he came and the second, and Derek is sure that the other can’t tell the difference as Derek hadn’t stopped thrusting into him even as he clenched around him. Stiles keens and writhes beneath him, broken pleas for a break, for something but the relentless drive of Derek’s cock inside him, filling him and refusing to have anything less than complete surrender._

_Derek only thrusts faster, until he’s coming, filling Stiles with cum and growling at how Stiles sounds taking his cum, the way he looks when Derek pulls out as cum spills down the back of thighs, his hole red and twitching from Derek’s use. He stuffs a plug into Stiles’s ass and collects the cum that’s escaped his hole on his fingers._

_He flips Stiles over and spins him around so he’s on his back, his head hanging off the edge of the bed and wraps a hand around his throat._

_“Open your mouth, pup,” Derek tells him and Stiles, lust and magic drunk whines, wiggles and opens his mouth, accepting Derek’s cum coated fingers, sucking them clean and shaking before taking Derek’s cock in his mouth and down his throat._

_He can feel the movement of his cock in Stiles’s throat in his hand and praises him for being such a good boy, for sucking his cock so well, for obeying his Alpha. Stiles swallows greedily, happily around him begging and working for his orgasm, but Derek won’t give it to him and tells him that he plans to paint Stiles with his come and rub it into his skin so even humans could smell that he was Derek’s._

_When Derek is ready to come, he pulls out and comes over Stiles’s face and body, painting him with stripes of white and Stiles only twitches on the bed and lets out a content rumble._

_His eyes are dreamy, unfocused, his lips are red and his face his flushed when Derek kneels to give him a sloppy, cum slick kiss. It’s just the right kind of intimate to make Stiles come one last time and earn Derek’s praise for being such a good boy as he rubs his come into his skin._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) Go from here. Closed are the borders between this world and yours!


	18. Author's Note: Beacon Hills Verse

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Too many words to make it a note. Here's the full section of the play, based on a prophecy that bits are referenced. You have no idea how much agonized over it and then which parts to put into the story. Feel free to skip it if you'd like and thanks for reading, commenting, kudo-ing. Only a few more chapters to go!

Listen, to what I have seen this day. A glimmering hope, a shining beacon, a band around us so tight, holds us shoulder to shoulder, in warmth and security and brags the strength of shields unharmed by strife, untouched by time, eternal. Hear it? The voice that speaks softly. These words of peace and company, the voice who speaks of a great beacon--a beacon we will build together. If you be willing to fight, this will be the sign to mark us here: the great sigil that calls you. Neither to limit nor repel, but to mark the front line against those that hunt you. May you find solidarity across land and sea, when the tide rises and overcomes the shore.

When the Hostiles prowl to your sacred circle and the Night Lands roar in the distance, should you find yourself without protection—may it be safe haven you have searched for. Where you may find peace and power and forgive the person you were before.

If ever you pleased the Goddess, may she guide you through the night. When hope fades and the shadows are cast, when the last spell breaks--may it be a beacon to guide you to safety.

When the moon goes dark and the forest is foe, when the earth is sky, where howls are lost in shadow--may it be the den you have journeyed for.

By the winds and flame that birth you,, may it be the peaks where you find solace in the call of the end--may you find peace beneath its light.

May the gods worshipped and fell guide you through battle. With sword and shield, when you have lost all, when home is behind, a ruin of blood-- find it anew, here.

Where sunlight shall find you and not burn, where silver cannot harm you, where the thirst is quiet--find it here beneath its light.

If you should find your dust black and dragon wings beat above you, if chaos reigns and hope is gone, if time is lost--may there be a light here for you. A shelter here for you and time here for you to grow the fields again.

When the stars burn out and there is nowhere left to go--may it be a light in the night. Until the last of strength fails you, until the last world’s word, until the last flickering star--run to us through the trees and wind. Lay your bow here by the heart with us and find peace beside the flickering lights.

To the eyes of the forest, those who fly with wings of light, when you are hounded, when your forest is burned, when the darkness swarms to drown your light--find rest and kindling here, so you may shine brighter on the next advance.

If demon’s gather and night falls, when the moon drowns the sun, if chaos reigns and hope is gone--follow the beacon to your family in the hills.

To the light of the divine, where no one fears to tread, for we watch you from below and above, and on all sides-- from its light demons run.

Beneath the beacon’s light, beneath the waves and sky--find your place here. For you are not forgotten, those who breathe of the eternal blue, who live in its depths and share its fate forever. You are welcome in this band we build. Across shore and tide, we reach out to you and call you kin.

Beneath the beacon’s light, we gather to discuss the fate of this haven we’ve built, so that it may be the haven worthy of your journey.

May it be a place to lay your weary soul at night’s fall, so that we may journey together and look upon it and know that we are in the same carriage.

When you find yourself alone, without a past and no future--may it be the hearth you seek and home you need to face another day.

So that we may learn of each other, so that we may learn with each other, so that we may grow together, let us gather and speak with voices unfettered by our pasts.

May we forgive our debts and settle our scores. Bury our hatchets here and come together to honor these words made real and ourselves reflected back to us in our dreams made real.

Such a place, lead by the oath of the beacon. Remembered and held here. Neither in front, nor behind, but together, the leaders of such a place, who cry out to the last:

_We are your ship and anchor, your shield and sword, your sigil and hope. We are your servants and leaders to bring you out of the dark. Bring us your tired, your hunted, your weak and weary. Bring us your outcast-ed, outlawed and love-starved. Bring us yourselves as you are. We give you a place to rest, a safe haven, a place to belong. Peace and strength to defend against your belief and from it all we shall make a band to draw us closer--a beacon of light in the darkest day. Find Sanctuary with us. Find Asylum with us. Find peace and acceptance here with us. For we will be your beacon, glimmering in the night, when hope is lost and the way is dark. For we will raise our shields, together in front and back, on all sides, when the scales turn gold and mark the darkness falling rises. With the silver moon’s riding and the golden sun’s light, we stand in defense of this beacon we have created, roaring all the stars alight to brighten the darkest night. May we unite beneath the Beacon and show you the way against the mist and shadows of those who wear the mask of truth, whose eyes glint mischief and deceit. For we are the light in the night. We are the heralds of the beacon come to light and the world’s ending. Though their numbers are great, their tricks are fierce, their armies vast, they shall not win. For it is not the magic of the universe which weaves this bond, but the magic of the hearts who take this oath that calls the beacon from its slumber, the ghosts to the front lines, the world in defense of this beacon we are. So though the way is dark now, take comfort in the light. Take peace in the heroes who defend, brother to sister, claw to wing, fang to sword, dust to spell, chant to light. When you lose your way, follow the beacon in the hills. For we are here, your light to lead you out of night, beyond the dark horizon and before the misted shores, beyond the clang of men’s swords, dragon claws and fire, to the arms who would defend you to the last. It is here we stand. Against the enemy, we contend. We take their weapons to brandish our shields anew. For as long as they rise, we will rise to meet them. For as long as we are here, we will hold the shield-wall. For as long as we hold this oath true, we are the beacon anew._


	19. The Beacon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Any one wondered what's up with the Beacon?

When Stiles wakes up, he’s feeling oddly warm and wolfy. The Pack is in the kitchen downstairs, he’s been moved to the room he usually occupies when he stays over and he feels exhausted…

He’s sleeping pants are also sticky with so much cum he isn’t sure how he didn’t wake up earlier.

_Oh god,_ he thought mortified. He’d fallen asleep with Derek on the floor in the living room and had dream hopped. Into whose dream and what it was about, he didn’t know, but he knew for sure that it involved a lot of really raunchy sex. He felt as if he’d been fucked to the point of possession, something more than when Gia and Pierce would dominate him too. He tries really hard not to think about it and offers kudos to whoever’s fantasy he’d stepped into and their partner as well as an apology for invading people’s dreams.

It became a thing he hadn’t quite gotten a hang of controlling since the Nogitsune, moving in between dream lands was something he hadn’t had a chance to do really, but he guessed you can’t go into dream lands unless you were asleep too.

He showers and tries to get rid of the utterly fucked out feeling he’s got, but it doesn’t help. His cheeks are still flushed and he’s got that glow as if he’s been fucked all night and maybe into the dawn. When he gets downstairs, the table is being set for the whole pack, plus twenty-two.

Lenara and Dasha are grinning at him, two lovely faces with demonic intent.

“You’re positively glowing,” Lenara beams at him.

Stiles rolls his eyes, “Good morning, Lenara.”

Dasha snickered as Stiles walks around them. The long table isn’t full, even with the addition, but he knows it doesn’t matter. Only the core pack, Lenara and Dasha are here and Stiles feels it’s as good a time as any to make the announcement with everyone congregating around the kitchen where Derek is working to make breakfast for the crowd.

Before he speaks, Lenara meets his eyes, “Be still when you have nothing to say, when genuine passion moves you, say what you’ve got to say and say it hot.”

Stiles glowers at her as she breaks into a fit of giggles. It’s the last day for the territory stay and the emissary children are heading home for a brief break before the school year starts. They were having breakfast with the pack and then Stiles was giving them a mock final test to go over everything they’d been learning over the summer.

“Is this the part where someone tells us what happened to the barrier?” Erica asked; sporting her new asymmetric hair cut that left her neck free for Boyd’s new teeth to nibble on.

The temple would definitely not be happy about that development. Oracles turned vampyr became blood oracles, Stiles bet that because of Erica’s mixed heritage she’d incidentally turned him into something else and in turn had been turned into something else as well. Blood oracles had power over the minds of people they fed from, they couldn’t do anything truly damaging without some serious training, but they made great interrogators and psychiatrists.

“I believe that’s in Stiles’s corner,” Derek said with a knowing grin. “Right, Miss Heironim?”

The room went quiet as the pack looked at him and Scott swallowed thickly.

“I will curse you with eternal fleas, sour wolf,” Stiles grumbled and let out a sigh. “Before the emissary children get here, I think it’s best to explain a few things.”

They waited for a few moments before Stiles began to speak, “As you all know, my Dad is Sheriff Nikodem Stilinski, my mom however…”

He breathed out as Scott’s eyes widened, “You’re going to tell them?”

“Tell us what?” Erica asked from Boyd’s arms.

“My real name is Joachim Przemyslaw Stilinski Heironim,” he said and waited for something. Maybe an uproar, but they only stared at him, gawking, jaw dropped.

“Heironim?”

“Yep.”

“Like Claudia?”

“Yep.”

“Like… Emissary?”

“Yep,” Stiles said with a nod. “I spent a lot of time with the Hales, Derek and I used to be secret best friends…when I got possessed my memories got all tossed around. They’re fixed now though.”

He isn’t sure what to expect but Lydia coming to him, hugging him tightly and apologizing for thinking he was evil incarnate, wasn’t it. Jackson didn’t apologize for shoving him lockers but he expected that.

“In other news,” Stiles continued. “I’m the one who reformed the barrier, yes I have a ridiculous amount of magic flowing through me… apparently since I was a baby and yes I am secretly a titan as well.”

They laughed at that and somehow it went over better than he expected. He knows that they’ll have more questions, but as his dad has arrived with the emissaries in training and Anai in her tiny police uniform, he knows it will have to wait. Nikodem is practically glowing with tiny Anai in his arms. His dad has always loved kids after all and after the turmoil of the last few weeks, everyone could you some tiny people time.

Breakfast is an affair of comic proportions. If someone isn’t not-so subtly hitting on Derek, then they’re glaring at Stiles or chatting with a member of the Pack. Anai is a bundle of giggles and pure joy in her Alpha’s lap eating whatever he feeds her with her tiny teeth. The triplets are silent looking between Erica and Boyd, the way she commands attention when she speaks about matters regarding the territory. It’s nothing confidential, but general running of the territory, progress of the repair and the like.

Emma, the eldest, does her best not to glare at the way everyone seems to respect her. Not only is she not a full Reyes, but some sort of freak of nature, consorting with an oracle. She can’t believe that the twitchy little disgrace is a ranking, well-respected member of any Pack let alone the Beacon Hills Pack. It pisses her off and makes her sick.

Erica was _nothing_. The runt and utter disgrace of the Reyes family, yet there she was commanding more respect than Emma ever had or could hope to have in Germany, regardless of her name.

The first part of their ending test is physical. They’ve improved, some more than others. Mikhaira managed to pin Alexandros and promptly celebrated the victory by high-fiving Allison. Stiles knows for sure that Mikhaira will more than likely come back to Beacon Hills if negotiations with her home territory go well. Ayr makes no moves to hide her wish to return the next year for post-study and maybe longer.

For the most part, it turns out as Stiles expected. The six who he figured would take advantage of Beacon Hills had and blossomed in their skills. The others had made some progress but not nearly as much as they could have. When it’s time for special abilities testing, Emma demands to face off against Erica.

“You can face a dragon,” Emma said with a grin. “But you won’t face me, Twitchy? Guess you haven’t changed as much as you think.”

Stiles shrugs and looks to Derek whose eyes narrow at her. He hears Erica’s heartbeat stutter and then thump steady again. She’s angry, boiling angry and just a little hurt. It’s her voice that tells him what he needs to know though.

“Alpha?” Erica asked looking at Emma.

He feels through their pack bond a muted rage burning at the core of her, but there’s that restraint and calm over it that makes him sure that Emma will walk away alive, but it’s the determination that makes him agree.

She needed this for herself, to finally let go of that part of her life maybe.

“Suppression only,” he said. “Stiles?”

Stiles shrugged and allowed Evelyn and Elena to join. Vampyr triplets had powers that they could use together it seemed only proper to test them fully.

Stiles stepped back as Erica took her place on the field before patting her shoulder, “Do what you must.”

She nodded and turned her eyes to the three women standing in front of her. She feels the twitching, the nervous twitch—no… not nervous, anticipation of a great tide of blood. She thinks of the days of them teasing her. Of the way they would fake seizures and laugh at her, the way they would shove her around and refuse to acknowledge her as their sister, trick her, prank her, generally be complete assholes her entire childhood. She thinks of how her parents treated her, bribing her to say that she was just a foundling or a cousin depending on the person who asked…She remembers how they abused her…

“Don’t hold back,” she hears from Lydia on the other side of the clearing.

Of course, Lydia understands. Druid children weren’t kind to those that weren’t exactly like them and Lydia being a Banshee meant she’d had a very similar experience to Erica growing up. It was something they shared on their day off, catching lunch in the territory where Lydia went for her fix and Erica was well known.

She slides a foot back and watches them, waiting and closes her eyes against the swarming memories because none of that matters now. None of it matter because she had a home and people who loved her, a family that claimed her , cheered and would kick anyone’s ass for her. An alpha and leader who was proud of her, a boyfriend who adored her and a place to belong.

So when they spoke of the past and charged forward, Erica doesn’t engage any of her demonic power, fighting the three of them as a vampyr only, claws and fangs out, deflecting their blows and fighting, pushing, pummeling them and knocking them into the dust.

She steps back when they fall and lets the stand to charge again, enraged and screaming about how she’s nothing, how they’re better, how she’s a freak, how much they hate her and Erica says nothing, knocking the taste from their mouths and their faces into the dirt with a cold clarity that isn’t surprising. The rage is calm, the thirst is quiet and she feels at pure peace even as they screech and rush at her.

There’s a crack when Erica’s knee meets Elena’s face, her nose is broken. Emma’s jaw s disjointed, and Evelyn is bent over cradling broken ribs, yet they stand again. Erica watches them, their shambling bodies of arrogance… They were never worth the pain they caused, never worth the suffering—never worth anything.

They were pathetic.

“How dare you look at us that way,” Emma growled her eyes flashing, fangs dropping, “You abomination. Looking down on true vampyr, on true Reyes? Who do you think you are? _”_

Erica tilts her head, “Something you won’t ever understand if you think this is about you.”

Emma charged forward swiping at her, drawing the other two’s powers into herself, increasing her speed, yet she can’t hit Erica.

“This isn’t about us, Twitchy?  Then what is it about?”

Erica snatched her arm and twisted it up behind her back, just short of breaking it.

“This is about letting go.”

Emma screeched, “Letting go my ass! Admit it, Twitchy. You’re just the same little—”

Erica’s knee in her stomach cuts her off as she chokes on the air that escapes her, her stomach in her throat, and bile and blood gushing out of her mouth.

“My name is Erica,” she said watching Emma fall to the ground, curled into herself, shaking.

When she falls and the timer runs out of time, Erica moves the three of them to the side of the clearing, gives them water, a package of blood each and moves to join the pack on the other side of the clearing. Derek squeezes her against him, kisses her hair and tell her she did well.

Raven demands to face off against Stiles.

“Wiccan to Wiccan,” she said. “You may have the book smarts, but everyone knows that the Stilinskis are subpar at magic.”

Stiles rolled his eyes, but obliged, stepping into the clearing and pulling a short dagger from apparently nowhere as she pulled out her wand.

“A dagger?” She asked. “You can’t be so low-level that you don’t at least have a _wand._ ”

He snorted, “I have a staff actually, but this dagger will do. It was gift from Marcelina Heironim.”

Her eyes narrowed at the blade as he turned the blade out and took his stance, “Whenever you’re ready, Pendragon.”

He heard the beginnings of the spell and stepped aside, just on the edges of her spell, avoiding the sigils and glyphs that manifested before lunging at her with the knife. She stepped back, the enchantment broken and tried another and another, but she wasn’t fast enough.

Watching, Derek grinned. He was fucking gorgeous, all power and skill and completely different from the goofy kid he knew when he was younger. Muscles flexing beneath pale skin, clothes pulled tight over the body moving so fast that it was a miracle that Raven hadn’t be cut. Glyphs and sigils flickered in an out of existence as Stiles moved, cutting through them. He was glorious and everything in Derek wanted to grab him and drag him into the woods for a fucking he would feel for weeks down to his soul.

Scott snorted, “She’s getting off light.”

“What do you mean?” Lydia asked.

“That’s not as fast as Stiles can move,” Scott said and it was true. Derek could guess that much from the fight on the way to the Beacon. He was moving just fast enough to break her incantations just before they were complete.

“He’s testing her incantation speed.”

 Derek nodded, where Erica had meant to absolutely destroy her sisters, Stiles was testing the Pendragon girl. To his eyes, she had gotten only fractionally faster than the last time she’d been tested and it made him warm with pride that his emissary could separate his duties from his personal vendettas so strictly…

Wait…. _Emissary?_ Derek snorted, he supposed it was a foregone conclusion.

“One minute,” Anai called out dutifully, watching the exchange.

Raven grunted, stepping out of his way, throwing up a blocking spell to give herself more time, yet he still managed to slip around it, striking at her barrier with that damned blade with strikes so fast she could only hold the barrier steady. When he stopped, she saw the sigils he’d carved into the barrier and saw her wand appear in his hand, her barrier turning into a bubble to trap her in the center of the clearing. Had that been the plan the entire time? Why a blade? How could he have carved into her barrier? How could he have done it? He’d said no words, who the hell was he? He wasn’t a Stilinski for sure.

Stiles examined her wand, it was a finely wrought wand, made for ward work, not battle magic, it wasn’t flexible enough in magic or in form, though the threading of mountain ash made it a great for defensive magic, hence her shield was as strong as it was. She had an understanding of combat, but she was so fearful, her mind was so easily distracted with the terror of the enemy pressing on her, that she had no thoughts left towards attack… But she’d improved from the last time, if only marginally. A few weeks ago, he would have ripped through her barrier at the level of power he used. It was a victory, if only a small one.

“Who the hell are you?” She growled. “You can’t just be an emissarial consultant.”

“Joachim,” he said with a smile. “Joachim Heironim, descendant of Merlin Emrys Ambrosius.”

Her jaw dropped, staring at him as some impossible thing as he waved his hand, let the bubble dissolve and handed her wand back.

“If you intend to be a battle mage, you will need a different wand. But if you’re going to be a purely defensive magician, you should have your wand maker modify this one to make it more rigid when still and more flexible when magic is channeled. You need to work on the speed of your incantation and concentration. I’ll give you pointers in your final assessment report. You did well.”

She took the wand, her eyes burning with shame. A Pendragon being bested by a Heironim _boy_ at that. _Well_ , he’d said. She’d lost, had her own defense turned against her by a _knife_. With that match, the first section was done and Stiles lead them to the conference room in City Hall, now organized into a bunch of desks in a circle, he had them all take a seat and breathed.

“This is your final assessment and it will cover everything you’ve been taught in your time year. I want to say that you all have grown since coming her and you should be proud of that. As you know, your homestay is not graded in the conventional sense but does become a part of your emissary profile that affects your ranking and of course your options going forward. If you’d like to come back for post-study, or simply to study here in your last semester, arrangements can be made. If you’d like a letter of recommendation, contact me. You all have my personal and business number, the number of the front desk at City Hall, and the Alpha’s direct line. Though you all are not from Beacon Hills, you were here in a moment of crisis and the bonds you’ve built while here makes you family wherever you go. Know that should you need a safe haven, we’re always here.”

He looked around the room and nodded, “The test is in four sections, the last is a reflection of your time here. You have until six o’clock to finish. That’s when your guardians will start arriving to pick you up. You may begin.”

With that, the test pages appear on their desks and he leaves the room, closing it behind him and heading towards his office to grade the papers he had left, to put together their farewell packages, and log in all of their information. Everyone would get a briefcase, the decorated with the favorite things on one side and their names on the other.

Mikhaira’s was decorated in the style of her favorite anime: RWBY. MMAVAR in the show’s title script beneath a picture of the six emissaries in training on the other in full assault mode: Mikhaira, Marq, Ayr, Vlad, Alexandros, and Rosalina. She’d been calling them a team since they’d fought together during the siege. It seemed fitting, ironically it worked to being pronounced “mawar” and fit the show’s naming conventions. She’d no doubt get a kick out of it. He’d taken the time to decorate her case with symbols representing each of them to complete the look.

Ayr’s had been a little harder to figure out, but the waterfall Scott took her to one her personal tour had been what he’d decided on. Marq’s had been of his parents and dragon’s gate, a picture that they’d found in Nartra’s collections of visitors. Alexandros’s had been of the coast and cliffs. Vlad’s of the view leading up the coast and towards the mountains. The original castle of Camelot for Raven, their favorite designers for the triplets, Rosalina’s was the group picture with her, Anai, Derek, and the Camaros in front of the Hale house, they’d been playing in the forest and were all smeared with dirt and beaming at the camera. The others, including Aurora, had been harder still, but he’d managed to get them together. They were sitting in his office filled with pictures and all sorts of things from their stay, jam from Mrs. Johnston’s shop, a book or two that would come in hand, Beacon Hills post cards signed by people in the territory they’d been around. Letters from members of the pack who’d spent time with them, letters from Derek. Things one could only get from Beacon Hills: jewelry and magical objects made in the territory, potions and mixtures of tea. They each received a cloak in the style of trainees of their species with pins fashioned for them, because even though some of them had annoyed them to tears, they were the first class of emissaries in training that Beacon Hills had ever hosted so Stiles had to establish a proper tradition.  Besides, the budget set for it had been ridiculous and he hadn’t even put a dent in it. It was half tourist package and half emissarial farewell. When he’d packed them all he sat down to write letters to each of them. Some went quickly, other were harder to write. He added an elvish incantation on the back of Ayr’s that would set her in the right direction for creating a barrier big enough for her clan’s territory to at least sleep easy at night.

He folded and sealed them all before placing them in their respective briefcases and closing them. He stacked them together, cloaked them and levitated them into the Jeep. Afterwards, he went to the conference room and announced the end of the test. The Pack joins them for the send off as everyone’s guardians have arrived and the nineteen of them stand in front of the pack and Stiles has their briefcases floating in a stack beside him.

“Though we say goodbye today,” Stiles said looking at them. “Know that it is not forever. Should need anything, we’re only a call away. You’re a part of the mafia now, whether you like it or not, and we protect our own.”

Mikhaira giggled as Stiles charmed the cases to float in front of their respective owners with their names on top.

“There are goodies in each of your briefcases, words from the pack, each other, and myself to you and well wishes.”

Mikhaira squealed at the sight of the picture and all the symbols before hugging Stiles tightly. She almost cried hugging the others. Marq did cry recognizing his parents and hugging Stiles thanking him. The trainees exchange hugs with members of the pack and of course Scott cries and there are flowers everywhere, twining in people’s hair and in their clothing.

When the Lord and Lady Reyes see Erica, they say nothing even as the triplets are silent. They meet eyes and stare. Erica is oddly relaxed, regarding them, waiting for them to speak. There’s a tension there that draws everyone’s attention.

Lord William Reyes looked at her as if she was some impossible thing, no doubt seeing shift in her since the last time he’d seen her. She wasn’t little, she wasn’t fearful, but a strong young woman fully capable of fighting him and whoever else she needed to prove that she wasn’t the shame of the Reyes coven, but a respected member of Beacon Hills.

“You’ve been here all this time?”

“You never looked for me,” Erica replied and that seemed to quiet whatever else they were going to say before leaving through the portal.

The Ochoas try for cordial and networking, but it’s obvious that Derek isn’t interested in forming any ties with them. He makes it a point to show them how much he favors Rosalina though, sure that at the very least, it will get her some better treatment and assure her that there’s always a place for her in Beacon Hills. Anai is a little more than sad to see her go, but when Rosalina promises that she’ll visit, they avoid too many tears being shed.

When the last of them have exited through the portal, they head to Palermo’s for dinner before splitting up to finish whatever it is they have left to do for the night. Stiles has tests to grades and reviews to submit and of course, there’s the normal pack business so it’s a long night for everyone.

What no one is expecting in the morning is the large naked man who looks like an older, hairier version of Derek to be carrying a woman who looks about Stiles’s age with all the features of the Hale family.

Derek opens the front door to see the man on his front porch and his jaw drops.

“G-Grandpa?”

“I found her!”

*

Stiles wondered what could have caused Derek to call a Pack meeting like this. Scott wasn’t sure and neither was Erica. No one had any clue other than the fact that it sounded urgent. When they arrived at the Hale House and went in they heard the sound of Anai’s laughter a male voice that wasn’t Derek’s.

“Higher, higher!”

They turned the corner to see Derek sitting in a chair, his head in his hands, a woman laid out across the couch, and an older version of Derek, in henley and jeans, tossing Anai in the air and spinning her around.

“You’re going to a force to be reckoned with when you get older,” the man said spinning her around. “It will be so much fun.”

He spun around and his eyes zeroed in on Stiles.

He let out a low whistle, “No room at all for Niko’ in there is there? How have you been kid?”

Stiles wasn’t sure what on earth was happening, but judging from the lost look on Derek’s face and the man standing, it was pretty obvious that this was Victor Hale, Talia’s grandfather and the only other living black wolf in the entire family.

“Grandpa,” Derek groaned, “Please explain this to me again? Where have you been? What do you mean you found Cora?”

The Pack came in as Victor began to introduce himself to them and tell them to take a seat, nuzzling Anai until she giggled.

“Exactly what I said,” he replied. “She was in some Council building. I picked her up and got her out.”

Stiles snickered, this was where Talia had gotten it from no doubt.

“What random council building?” Derek asked. “Where?”

The man shrugged, “Somewhere on other side. Wanna say it was warm, kind of balmy, smelled like the Mediterranean. In a building that looks like Ta’s”

He groaned again, his sister had been in Vatican, Italy, in the City Hall and his grandfather had, more or less, waltzed in and waltzed out with her.

“How’d you manage that?” Isaac asked. “City Hall in Vatican is so heavily guarded.”

“It’s a black wolf thing. Leaping gets you all turned around sometimes, I almost didn’t recognize where I ended up till I smelled Derek and Joachim.”

Eyes went to Derek as his grandfather walked towards the kitchen with the intention to get something for him and Anai to snack on.

“A black wolf thing?” Erica asked, “Explain.”

Derek shrugged, his great grandfather hadn’t exactly explained what he’d meant to him, but Rosalina told him that black wolves had some additional abilities beyond being a Lycan attributed to whatever it was that make their fur black and the gene so strong. Every black wolf in the family looked like Derek and Victory as the same face and body was merely copied and pasted in the family line.

“So… what’s your super-power?” Erica asked, “Besides being devilishly handsome.”

They heard Victor laugh from the kitchen and when he came, back he promptly said that she had spunk and he liked her already. Derek knew from experience that it took a while to resettle in human skin when you were a wolf for days at a time, given that Victor had been running as a wolf for as long as Derek could remember, it was miracle the man could even formulate world that weren’t Lycan or mostly growling. He guessed it had something to do with age, or maybe it was a black wolf thing that would come to him eventually.

“Is that what you’re going to look like when you get older?” Erica asked, “’Cause yum… he could be your Dad… isn’t he almost as old as Lenara?”

Victor’s eyes lit up, “ _Lenara?_ She’s still here in Beacon Hills? I haven’t seen her in _ages_.”

“Yes, she’s still here, same place.”

“I’ll be back, maybe tomorrow,” with that he took a step forward and vanished.

Scott shrieked, “Where’d he go?!”

Derek shook his head, he supposed to Lenara’s and what kind of history she had with Victor he didn’t want to know. Instead, he lifted Anai on to his lap, explained that the woman lying unconscious on the couch was his sister and asked Stiles to look her over for injuries. Her mind was a little scrambled from being kept unconscious for so long but Stiles levitated her to a guest room, placed a seal on her headboard and told Derek that she should be up and able to talk the next day.

What Stiles didn’t tell him was that she would freak the hell out when he came into the room once he heard her moving around. Claws out, eye flashing, she screamed as he caught her out of midair and held her against him, rumbling at her even as her claws dug into his back and her teeth sunk into his shoulder.

“Cora,” he rumbled. “It’s okay, it’s me. It’s Derek.”

By fractions, she calmed down, her claws retracting, her teeth growing duller. The charm Stiles covered the room with that evoked the scents of Talia and the original Hale House, and Derek sinking into her senses.

“ _Derek?_ ”

He hushed her, stroking her hair and holding her, supporting her wait as she went boneless in his arms, “You’re safe, Cora. You’re home.”

She whimpered, whined and sobbed into his shoulder and he held her for as long as she needed him to before guiding her back to bed. He heard Victor coming through the door, sweeping Anai off the ground and taking charge of breakfast. Stiles bounded down the stairs to rescue the house from the kitchen fire Victor was bound to start as he was completely out of touch with modern technology, leaving Derek to console Cora until she went back to sleep.

It takes weeks for Cora not to wake up screaming, memories of the fire, of being dragged chained and dragged through the dark, through portals, in wolfsbane and mountain ash laced chains all coming back to her. But Derek was always there, choosing to work from home rather than leave her alone in the house. Victor is quite happy to spend time with Anai, playing in the woods, teasing Stiles when he shows up.

“You look just like your mother from behind,” he said with a wolfy grin and a laugh as Stiles narrowed his eyes at him.

“I would give you fleas, but you hang out with Anai too often. Be warned.”

Victor laughs every time and ruffles his hair, happy to see him, happy to see him and Derek together again. When Cora is calm enough to recognize him, there’s a different sort of light in his eyes that makes Stiles thinks that maybe Victor is the originator of the Beacon Hills Poker Face because there’s no reason that the depth of sorrow in those eyes could hide so well behind his teasing. Stiles gives him a hug one night as if to say everything would be alright and isn’t surprised to find the man hugs him back and his hair gets damp from tears that Victor doesn’t sound like he’s shedding.

Derek and Stiles are seen around the territory together more and more often. Cora and Victor have taken a shine to Anai and steal her away all the time to go running around the territory announcing that the eldest Hale and the youngest daughter have returned to Beacon Hills.  

Stiles isn’t completely sure when it started, but he recognizes it as something North of subtle and blatant. For one, Derek takes the time to touch him. Not that he doesn’t touch everyone else in the Pack and under his protection, but there’s an intimacy to his touch that he can’t write off as them just being secret best friends.

When they’d known each other before, he thought it was a wolf thing, but as with age comes understanding, he could tell it was more of a _I want you_ thing. It’s late at the Hale House, Anai, Cora, and Victor are already in bed and Derek is waiting for him when Stiles walks in to the house, up the stairs and into Derek’s study. He still isn’t totally comfortable using Talia’s study, but Stiles suspects that in time, or when someone else in the House needs a study, he’ll move. Derek is sitting at his desk, flickering his eyes across the computer screen when Stiles comes in.

“Sup, twinkie?”

Stiles falters at the wolfish grin and the name. He hadn’t heard it since before Derek left for New York. His cheeks flush instantly and he growls.

“Not all of us are graced with a manly beard alright,” he growled. “I should give you fleas in just your beard to spite you.”

Derek snorted, as if. He’d been threatening him with fleas for years and still hadn’t managed it. Derek got up and crossed the room to Stiles. His hands moving to touch his neck and squeeze at the tension there before frowning.

“You’re tense.”

“That happens,” Stiles said, half moaning the words as Derek digs his fingers into the muscles there.

Stiles shakes his head free of the rush and then pushes at Derek’s hand before looking at him.

“Listen here,” Stiles started. “I came here to talk to you.”

Derek had the nerve to look amused, “Oh? About?”

“This,” he said gesturing between them. “Us.”

Derek’s eyebrows lifted in surprised before a slow smile began to form on his face, “Is this about the touching?”

“Yes, this is about the touching. And the scenting and—“

The words don’t come because he’s shoved up against the door, with Derek’s hands fisted in the front of his clothes, a heavily muscled thigh between his legs and his eyes glowing red. Stiles throws his hands up, almost on a reflex and holds still, meeting his eyes.

He isn’t sure what to expect to come from Derek’s mouth, but what does come definitely wasn’t on the list.

“I’ve wanted to fuck you since I turned fifteen.”

Stiles’s jaw dropped, “What?”

“I’ve wanted—”

Stiles rolled his eyes, “I heard you the first time. Elaboration. You had Paige—”

“You were thirteen, Stiles.”

“And then Kate.”

“You were fourteen, Stiles.”

“And then you went to New—”

“I didn’t remember you, Stiles.”

Stiles shuts his mouth then, because yeah, that was true. Claudia had done it to protect them both and in all honesty had probably protected them more than she imagined.

He growled, jerking Stiles back to the present as Derek sets him down and spins him around to press against the door, his nose in Stiles’s neck, hips carefully away from Stiles’s backside.

“You smell so damn good,” he groaned, “You have no idea how hard it is to control myself when we’re alone.Then… _now…_ ”

“Right,” Stiles said awkwardly licking his lips. “I was… uhm… going to ask you about… so I guess…uhm…”

“Out with it, twinkie,” he growled in his ear taking an unholy pleasure in just pressing his scent into him and smelling Stiles. He’d smelled like people in the territory, Pack, but not Derek when he’d walked in and it chafed him in all the wrong ways.

“I had the hugest crush on you,” Stiles admitted a little too quickly, Derek’s hand sneaking to pull his shirt out of his pants and slide under, dragging his scent and his magic up the center of Stiles’s chest. It’s a heady feeling hearing Stiles’s words and fumbling turn to needy whines and keening.

Lycan instincts made things so much simpler, turning off Stiles’s Wiccan, a mile a minute brain, would get him the answers he wanted.

“Yes or no, Stiles,” Derek growled in his ears.

“I…”

Stiles growled, trying to resist the flood of magic into him, but Derek, the fucker, knew what he was doing now. Knew where to press to turn off his Wiccan brain and unleash what was essential his ego. Fuck, he wanted it. He wanted it badly and there was nothing he could conjure say it was a bad idea. Hell, it was a long time fucking coming even without their secret friendship for years.

“We can’t…”

“We can’t what, Stiles?” Derek asked, licking up his neck, “Can’t what?”

“Here. We can’t here.”

Derek smirked sliding his hand into his pants and palming Stiles’s growing erection, pressing his own against Stiles’ backside. He could taste Stiles’s magic flickering, sparking beneath his skin.

“Well you’d better figure something out,” he growled, undoing his belt, unzipping his pants and let them fall to the ground.

“Derek,” he gasped, trying to wriggle free, “Just… a second…”

Derek caught his hands above his head, pressing them solidly into the wood of the door with one hand and lifting the back of his jacket and shirt to taste the inked words on his back. Stiles keened and tugged at his hands.

“Fuck, just a second!”

“I will,” Derek promised with a chuckle. “As soon as I have you the way I want you. The way you want to be for me.”

Stiles wasn’t sure what the best part was as Derek pulled him away from the door and tugged him out of his clothing, spinning him around and sending them both to the floor. Stiles squirmed trying to keep a grip on his sanity as his magic flickered, excited and ready to burst free. He felt the seals cracking and knew if it went on any longer, no matter how good Derek’s thigh felt against his dick, it would be a magical nightmare for them to have sex in his office.

“Derek just—”

Derek’s lips captured his own in a kiss so possessive, a new wave of pure Lycan will washed over him. He whimpered, baring his neck and reaching for Derek’s shoulders pleading for the Alpha to get him naked, to touch him, to do anything and everything he wanted to him.

“D-Derek,” Stiles gasped. “Please… just a second…”

“Eight years,” Derek told him. “Not a moment more.”

Stiles shut his eyes against the onslaught, trying to steady himself even as Derek manhandled him out of his clothing on the floor of the office. Had to be somewhere inundated with magic, somewhere where if a seal broke it wouldn’t be bad.

Derek’s hands sliding over his skin, his mouth and tongue kissing hot, wet lines between his moles, over his abs down his thighs. In the moment Derek’s hands went for the waist band of his briefs, Stiles focused, felt the surge, and felt them crashing into the dirt in the grotto of the magic pool.

Derek grinned, looking up to where the moon glowed in the sky, full and beautiful about them before looking down at Stiles who looked just as he did in his dream, bathed in moonlight, his eyes glowing that answering amber, vulnerable, and flushed and his.

His.

All his.

Derek wrapped a hand around Stiles’s ankle, “I’m going to ruin you.”

Then, his underwear are gone, Derek’s shirt is over his head and something in him says that Derek means exactly what he says. The world flips as Derek rolls him onto his stomach, pressing his hand into the center of the seals and holding him still. Stiles freezes and begins to squirm in earnest. Derek knows, maybe he’s read up on seals, maybe it’s just a guess, or maybe he reads Stiles’s reaction well-enough to know that his seals are on the fritz.

Derek doesn’t think about any of that, only that his wolf knows that there’s something off about his scent. His magic is there but not in its former concentration. He wants it back, he wants that Stiles, that powerful being oozing magic beneath him now, no matter what he has to do to get him there. He feels his wolf rising, growling and pressing against the seals as he pulls Stiles’s hips up and drags his own pants down and off. Stiles squirms, letting out whines, trying to shake the hold the lycan energy has on him, but Derek is persistent.

“Give in, pup,” Derek encourages with a deep rumble. “ _Let me have you._ ”

“Derek—I can’t…”

It’s insane, the words he’s speaking have nothing to do with what his body is telling him. His magic is screaming, howling in Derek’s ears: _own me, ruin me, mark me, mate me—_

_Alpha._

“Can’t what?” Derek growled, “I need words Stiles.”

Stiles can’t help but think that’s ironic since Derek is the notoriously silent one. He hears a wet sound and can only imagine Derek’s fingers in his mouth, getting them wet to prep Stiles and almost screams at the first probing push of Derek’s fingers.

“Good,” he rumbled. “So very good for me.”

“Can’t—” Stiles gasped. Not like this. His seal would break and then what? He had no idea? He could kill Derek, he could blow up… he could lose everything, he had idea.

“They’ll break,” he gasped, keening and arching as Derek slid a finger into him and groaned.

“ _So tight_ ,” he growled. “ _There’s no way you should be that tight if you were fucking Gia and Pierce._ ”

Stiles had the mind to tell him that they didn’t have sex nearly as often as everyone thought they did, but couldn’t think beyond the curl of Derek’s finger and the insistent pressure against that spot that made his magic twitch and rush around. He felt it pushing at the seals on his back, the way it always did. A wolf’s howling in his blood, burning to be let free, to run wild and Stiles clenched his hands against it.

“Fuck, Derek, please—”

The smallest circle of ink shattered into light and then vanished at the fall of Derek’s hand on his ass, a hard strike that blossomed red and drew a groan from Derek’s chest. He went back to fingering Stiles roughly with a maddened pace, the smell of magic growing stronger, Stiles’s magic growing stronger as he fingered him open. Stiles cried out, squirming and shaking beneath him, pleading for him to slow down, to give him a break, to do anything but what Derek’s wolf was driving him to do.

“I want you free,” Derek said. “I want you under no one else’s control but mine. I want all of it Stiles and you’re going to give it to me.”

Stiles shakes his head clawing at the dirt to scramble away to get a grip, but the magic is swirling, blotting out any sense and he’s sure it’s visible in the air now, a swirling vortex of power around them, mingling his and Derek’s wolf together through the air. Fuck the cosmos could align and it would feel like this as Derek hold him down and drags his cock across Stiles’s open, wet hole growling deep sensual things that make Stiles’s insides quake.

It isn’t the words, Stiles knows, but the meaning behind them. It’s all Lycan in his ears, passion and intent, floating in with the magic Derek is pressing into him. Lips at his shoulder, a tongue tracing the intricacies of his seals, the words he’d asked for because he couldn’t trust his own strength to contain himself, to anchor him. Derek’s hand on his neck is the only art of him that feels solid, anchored in the maelstrom of power around them.

His magic rushes against the seals, wanting to be free, wanting to be closer, egging Derek on to push him, push him over the edge, to free them both and Stiles just can’t let go.

So he’s screaming every nerve in him crying out at the onslaught of Derek’s tactile torture, the drag of his thick, heavy cock between his cheeks, catching on the rim barely and earning a hiss from them both. He’s screaming to drown out the words in his ears, but it’s not loud enough because his magic hears Derek, his soul hears Derek’s wolf and what he wants from Stiles, what he’s demanding from Stiles, what Stiles wants to give him.

“Say it, Stiles,” he demands, grinding against Stiles’s ass needy and thrumming with power. “Don’t hold back. Just say it.”

The scent of him is filling all of his senses and damn it he’s so on edge that he could come thrusting against the curve of Stiles’s ass, surrounded by his magic. He holds on though, forcing Stiles’s face into the dirt enjoying the way his eyes flicker from deep brown to glowing amber, the way he whines and fights the words he wants to say.

It’s beautiful and probably more primal that it should be to dominate him like this…like a beta who needed to be put in their place, assured of their place beneath him, with him. It made all his alpha instincts rise and push forward, forcing Stiles to essentially present his ass to him. An offering of supple flesh and obedience….

By the moon, he was going to have exactly what he wanted, the way he wanted it…

His body arches and his ass presses back into him and Derek knows it’s only a matter of time before the words come, and Derek is inside him and all heaven breaks loose. A hand on his hip, just as smooth and curvy and delectable as in Derek’s dreams, the other hand wrapped around the back of Stiles’s neck as he thrusts against Stiles’s ass. Precum slicking the way further and dragging against Stiles’s hole deliciously slow, completely opposite to how Derek plans to fuck him senseless.

“D-D-Der…”Stiles gasped, his fingers clenching, his nails digging into the last of his sanity, holding the last of his seals together by force and screaming.

“Let go, Joachim,” Derek said against his ear. “Let me love you.”

Stiles freezes beneath and for a moment the universe is silent before the ink on his back lights up and shatters. Magic rushes over Derek’s senses and hears the word he’s been waiting for:

_Yes._

He slides in, mind filled with nothing more than Stiles beneath him, all power and ancient knowledge swirling and at his mercy, crying out and begging for him to fuck him harder. Stiles’s hips raise just a bit to change the angle of Derek’s thrust, offering himself to him, submitting at last and relaxing as Derek fucks him so deep he can feel it in his soul. His Wiccan heart and Derek’s wolf tangling until they’re inseparable and it feels as though all the universe floods him with Derek’s hand on his neck, on his hip, cock in his ass and his voice to assure him that he isn’t some ethereal being, but a body currently being fucked into the Earth.

When Derek flips him over to smash their lips together and hike Stiles’s legs over his shoulder, he feels himself sliding across the floor, he’s dirty and muddy and Derek’s teeth are sinking into his neck. He feels Derek’s muscles flexing, holding him open and pulling him to meet his thrusts and in the haze he sees the ripple through the pool, the way the once solid light turns into liquid and swirls, twisting up and reaching for the sky in a slowly building cyclone.

Derek feel it, a great crescendo through him, which he thinks is just his orgasm, so he picks Stiles up, sits back on his heels and thrusts harder. His skin is tingling, his wolf is howling and there’s so much _power_ coursing through him that he isn’t sure if he’s a Lycan or an elemental. Stiles eyes have begun to glow that pure cyan beaming out into the night even as he’s screaming. Derek can hear something else beyond the roaring silence that washes over him, but he can’t stop, he can’t stop, won’t stop, his wolf rushing through Stiles, marking every inch of him, of this place they call Beacon Hills.

He feels the territory and Stiles and the territory through Stiles’s mind, feeling as though he’s being poured over the territory, becoming a part of the barrier. He can see enemies on all sides, feel every edge of the territory.

And when it fades to light and pleasure, he wonders if he’ll ever ask Stiles on a proper date.

*

Ayr is awake, smiling at the picture of the waterfall on the back of her briefcase. The incantation Stiles gave her had held the Night Furies and all other manner of creature at bay for the last few nights. Her people are sleeping again, resting. Though they continue their nomadic paths, there are less men to stand guard, more time for love and fun in the daylight hours, more time for sleep at night.

The briefcase was filled with all manner of things that were both frivolous and useful. A new set of boots from Lydia because, as her note said, there was no need not to be stylish while kicking ass. They were made of dragon hide and fashionable. The cloak was weaved with protective spells, no doubt by Stiles. There were magic gems and anchoring stones and pictures from her time in Beacon Hills. She walked to the edge of her small camp, just inside the barrier line to see the eyes of the night staring back at her. The body leapt forward and was repelled by the barrier. She smiled and looked beyond the creature to the distance where Beacon Hills was. She could faintly see the glimmer of the barrier, a dim light in the night.

“What are you still doing awake my child?” She looked up to see her mother approaching her. “You return to school tomorrow. You should be resting.”

She smiled and nodded before turning back, “I will soon.”

Kyra sat down beside her, draping the blanket she had around her shoulders over Ayr’s shoulders and cuddling close.

“You’ll catch your death out here like this.”

Ayr hummed and leaned against her mother, “You’re thinking of Beacon Hills aren’t you?”

She nodded, “They were just so… peaceful. It really was like a dream even through the siege… there was just something…inspiring about it.”

Kyra nodded, “You intend to return.”

“I wouldn’t leave you.”

“You didn’t answer my question.”

Ayr sighed, she’d considered it. Maybe for post-study, or independent research, but never permanently. Her place was with her family in the small camp they called a territory.

“What is that?” Kyra asked and Ayr turned her vision to the distance. Through the mountains and over the hills, a light growing brighter and brighter, shooting up through the cloud bank a ripple went through the barrier in the distance and its light grew brighter. More than a distant star or a glimmering hope, but a beacon in the night.

“Beacon Hills,” Ayr replied. “That’s Beacon Hills.”

*

This would not do, he was sure looking into the distance, to the light shining. They all knew what that light could mean, what it would mean for those in turmoil now. Unearthing all those whispered stories about a beacon that led one to safety without question…

A place that the Council was meant to be.

“We’re stepping up the plans,” the eldest said. “Wake her up.”

“She’s gone,” another said. “And we have a report about a Joachim Heironim in Beacon Hills.”

That was impossible and he growled, “Then gather the legions. We march. Declare Beacon Hills as an officially Hostile territory, initiate Martial Order on all Council Territories and mobilize. _Now_.”


	20. We Are Here!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Last Minute Redemption and Real Talk

When Stiles wakes up, he isn’t lying on the dirt floor, nor does the world feel as muted. He feels like he’s only made up energy, swirling around and the world is much of the same. Glowing, riveting, maddening sections of energy the collide against one another to denote where one thing ends and the other begins. He can feel his body beneath the sheets, yet feels them as if they are not separate from him. He can feel the energies of the structure of the house, the Lycan presence in every fiber of the house. He can feel Cora, Anai and Victor as after images, the Pack and Derek’s wolf curled up beside him.

Derek is a very bright figure beside him with a wolf, glowing a star-blue in his chest. He turns to see dark hair sticking up off a head he knows well. The other is fast asleep, an arm thrown over his waist, Derek’s nose buried in his side. He almost smiled because if anyone saw big bad Alpha Black Wolf Derek curled up to him like this, it may actually… help his imagine.

_ Fucker… _

He stifles a groan while freeing himself from Derek’s grip. It’s easier than he expects, but that may be because Derek’s bed is suffused in his scent and there’s a tether between them now. Stiles can feel it a gentle hook in his magic, tugging to let him know that Derek is there, okay, sleeping, and dreaming of happy things. He shuffles to the bathroom to shower and realizes that even the simple act of standing beneath the shower has the potential to make him dizzy. Each drop of water, teeming with energy and magic, and so much undirected power. He scrubs as fast as he can and gets out, gets dressed and heads downstairs to make breakfast. The kitchen is almost safe, the dull roar of electricity being manageable, at least until he starts cooking.

He finds himself staring into the pan of eggs, watching the energies shift and collide until a hand turns off the stove and takes the pan off the heat. Hands pulsing with Lycan energy: Derek’s hands.

“Joachim?” Derek says softly. Stiles stares at his mouth watching the air shift and resonate, feeling the energy in his ears, coursing through his brain. “You alright?”

Stiles can’t answer him, his mind still shaking at the feeling of his words pouring over him and lets out a low whimper.

Derek pulls him close, burying is face in the curve of his shoulder and stroking his hair. His chest is bare, warm and thudding with his heart. Stiles can hear it, the coursing of his blood, feel his magic moving though him, keeping him alive. Feel the wolf just beneath the surface and reaches out to stroke it.

Derek grunts and groans, his muscles tensing around him.

“ _ Fuck, twinkie, don’t do that… _ ”

Stiles doesn’t understand what he means as Derek lifts him off the floor and carries him into the living room. It’s quieter, farther away from the kitchen. Derek wraps him in a blanket, kisses his head and tells him that he’ll call Lenara and make breakfast. Stiles curls up on the couch, beneath the blanket that’s full of memories, new and old, and exists somewhere in between the earth and the past.

Derek isn’t sure what’s happened, but he calls Lenara who tells him to turn on the Territory News. He does so while finishing the eggs Stiles started.

“ _ The Council has officially declared Martial Order across all Council Territories and has instituted a draft to retaliate against Beacon Hills for the recent attacks. Anyone who is shown to be a Beacon Hills sympathizers will be considered a terrorist and dealt with accordingly. _ ”

No fucking way.

The front door opens with the Pack calling out for Derek.

“Derek! Derek!” Erica calls heading straight for the kitchen.

“I just saw—”

“Come outside and fucking look!”

He frowned but when she drags him through the front door, it’s obvious what she’s talking about. A great tower of light shooting up from where the secret grotto is into the sky, beyond the Beacon, which ripples with its power.

“What the hell is that? Where the hell is Stiles? And what’s this about us being terrorists?”

“Beacon, Couch, Fuck the Council,” is his automatic response before pulling her back inside to direct to where Stiles is curled up on the couch and the rest of the pack looks down at him.

“What the hell did you do to him?” Erica asked. “Fuck his brains out?”

Derek rolled his eyes, yes that was part of it, but not all of it, “I broke his seals.”

Scott’s eyes widened, “You did what now?”

“Broke his seals.”

“Which ones?”

“All of them.”

Scott’s jaw dropped and he looked at Stiles who was staring somewhere in the vicinity of Scott’s heart.

“I’ve called Lenara and hopefully—”

“I smell I’m right!” Lenara’s voice rang out cheerfully accompanied by Dasha in jeans and a crop top.

Derek stepped aside letting her come in to kneel by Stiles’s face and get a good look into his eyes. She nodded with a humming sound. It was about what she expected. He just needed a little more time to get situated and get reacquainted with his own magic. It was a lot, being a Paladin and all. The usual brown was swirling with all sorts of colors, free floating and mystic.

“What’s wrong with you?” Stiles asked, frowning, his shifting eyes drifting over the network of the curse over her body. He could probably see the mash-up of energies that she was, the way they constricted and reacted everywhere.

Lenara laughed, “What did Stiles tell you about the seals?”

Derek shook his head, “Nothing really.”

“Some of them were post-possession standards, crutches if you will to facilitate his healing, some of them were put there by Claudia to protect him. If the Council could see all the magic Stiles actually had on his own, it wouldn’t have taken long to figure out that the other half of Joachim Stilinski was Joachim Heironim. Boy or not.”

Lenara stood moving away from him as Dasha moved a little closer to see if maybe she could do something to get him back on his feet, “He needs some time to adjust. I’ve called Marcelina to see if she can do anything to help it along, but for now it’s just a waiting game.”

Dasha let out a scream, falling back shaking, the visage of her melting away to that masculine visage they’d all seen occasionally, but had been beside Lenara in one of the monumental pictures of Beacon Hills’ beginning. He shuddered, shaking his head and looking at Stiles’s hand that was still outstretched and shimmering with magic along his fingertips.

“Wait…” Jackson started. “What?”

Magic fizzled out at the ends of his hair and Lenara gawked at the man on the floor in jeans and a crop top, his pectoral pressing at the fabric. He looked delectable, but seeing those eyes looking at her felt like some distant memory.

“Dasha’s… a man…?”

Lenara didn’t even look at Isaac, sinking to her knees to look at him as he looked at her completely dumbfounded.

“Hey,” he greeted. “Long time no see, angel.”

Lenara choked on a laugh, “You’re still wearing lace thongs for me, demon.”

He laughed, his head back and mouth open. It’s a rich warm sound that reminds them of infinite light and uncorruptible lightness, like the fluttering of wings…

“Dasha…” Kira started, staring at the man on the ground in awe. “You’re an angel aren’t you?”

He looked up at her with a grin, “Very clever fox.”

For just a moment, that made complete sense, Derek thought. He’d assumed druid, but her impartiality, or rather his, impartiality… their impartiality?

“Which is it?”

Dasha laughed, “Neither and both.”

Erica opened her mouth to ask more, but Derek cut her off, “No.”

She deflated almost instantly before moving to the table to talk about the next course of action. Stiles remained on the couch, studying the intricacies of the universe in his eyes and trying to settle himself back into his body.

It feels familiar, like when he was young, much younger than he could remember. His magic and life reaching out to other, empowered and empowering in a constant ebb and flow. As if he was a part of the void and completeness all at once.

It was like a page from the Solomon’s Book, which now that he thought about it had a striking resemblance to things he and his oldest living relative would talk about sometimes when he’d been in Poland and unable to sleep. Another man who’d lost so much in the war of his children yet somehow managed to see that the world wasn’t completely hopeless.

“No doubt the Council is making designs to advance on us,” Allison said laying out a map. “We’ve got known allies here and known enemies that side with the Council.”

Derek nodded, “Reach out to everyone we have any connections with, that includes the home territories we helped in the attack and the territories of everyone who took their homestay here. We need to know not only where they stand, but what the Council has plans to do with them.”

“I’ll do it,” Stiles’s voice as is far away and echoing. There’s a wave of magic that comes with the words that feels like raw power.

Derek turns to look at him, standing now but oddly seeming to flicker into and out of existence. His eyes closed and walking towards them.

“You sure?” Erica asked looking at him, “Maybe you should wait a little longer… You’re running at like three thousand right now.”

Stiles opened his eyes to look at her with an odd smile, “I’ll be fine. There are a lot of people making their way towards us.”

He conjures images for them to watch the trajectory of the bands he speaks of, their ETA and numbers.

“There will be a lot of injuries, so we’ll need to get everyone on high alert. I’ll expand the barrier as far out as possible.”

“You can do that?” Derek asked, gawking at him. “Since when the hell could you do that?”

Stiles smiled at him, “Since I became the medium for the Beacon.”

Derek frowned and looked at him, he didn’t remember much of last night… only that he’d claimed Stiles in every way that mattered, broke the seals, and had fucked them both into oblivion. Beyond that he was sure, but there are images flickering behind his eyelids of glowing cyan symbols dragging themselves across pale skin, streams of cyan light falling from the other’s eyes… he wasn’t sure if it was from their night together or actually reforming the barrier but it didn’t matter.

“Before any of this,” Derek started. “There’s something we have to take care of first.”

They look at him strangely, but when Derek announces over the Beacon Hills Emergency system that there would be a gathering in the capital’s town square, Stiles’s stomach knots.

Derek dragged him to Talia’s old study, closed the door and kissed him.

“What…?”

Derek grinned, “I’m naming you emissary.”

Stiles vanished before he could say a word more and Derek isn’t sure if it’s because he was excited or plan freaking out, but he had a good idea.

*

When Scott arrives at the Stilinski house, Nikodem is standing in Stiles’s bedroom doorway trying to get him to calm down. He shook his head. Derek was right… he was freaking out.

“Buddy,” Scott said stopping his nervous pacing. “Just stop and take a deep breath.”

Stiles isn’t he’s shaking and his magic is busy moving things behind him.

“Sc-Scott I-I…”

“There’s the meeting in about ten minutes,” Scott said calmly. “Are you packing to move in or runaway?”

Nikodem’s eyebrows raised because that… definitely wasn’t what he was expecting.

“I-I… I don’t know…I’m not doing anything.”

Scott turned him around to let him watch as his entire room began to pack itself up into a trunk: books, clothes, toiletries, and anything that wasn’t furniture. Even the posters rolled themselves up and stuck themselves neatly inside the trunk.

“Sc-Scott… I… I can’t be emissary.”

Scott snorted as Claudia’s cloak floated into the center of the room along with his staff.

“Your magic seems to think you can.” Scott grinned, “And I definitely know you can.”

Scott didn’t understand. Being a consultant was one thing, he was replaceable. Being emissary meant… taking her place and Stiles didn’t know if he was ready for that. It would mean admitting that she was really… truly… gone forever.

“Scott…”

“I don’t think your mother would have wanted to pass the torch to anyone else,” Scott told him with a sigh.

“I second that,” Nikodem said from behind them. “She and Talia always said that Beacon Hills would be led by Heironim and Hale for generations… “

“Though I’m sure they weren’t really planning on you two boning each other,” Scott said.

Stiles frowned and looked at Nikodem.

“No, they definitely were,” he said. “I never saw it but your mother and Talia always did…”

“Dad,” Stiles said blinking slowly. “This is going to be really… really random.”

“I’ve lived with you most of your life Stiles, random is the state of normalcy.”

“But… did my mom and Talia ever…” Stiles’s voice drifted off, his eyebrows raised meaningfully. Nikodem flushed and he cleared his throat.

“That would be a yes then…”

“Your mother and Talia were close.”

“That is a definite yes,” Scott started.

“So did you and Derek’s Dad ever…”

“Stiles!”

“That is an embarrassed; I may have loved it, yes… You were a swinger!”

“Not.”

“Were,” Stiles said almost smugly. “I knew there was something going on all that time we spent being babysat by Lenara….”

Nikodem scoffed, “Shut up or you’ll be late for your inauguration… just like your mother was.”

Stiles blinked and looked down at the sound of the buckle of the cloak fastening and the length of it brushing against his boots.

“Let’s go.”

The jeep Is in the driveway looking as though it’s had a fresh coat of paint, the wheels shine and the leather is polished. It trucks along to the town square with them in it and before Derek can even present Stiles as their emissary, he feels a ripple in the barrier and he can hear the sound of terrified screaming.

“Emissary—“

“My first act as emissary is to tell everyone that the East and West borders are receiving refugees and if we meant to keep our alliances, ship the fuck out.”

Derek almost grinned as he began floating in the air, “I’m going to fend off dragons, follow when you can.”

Derek nodded, “You hear Emissary Hieronim, move out!”

The shock has no time to set in as the distress relief and first responders began to move out flowing Stiles as he conjures a barrier large enough for the first wave to get through.

They drive just inside the barrier, setting up medical transport and like. Stiles flies right through it, swinging his staff with a roaring spell to catching the beginning of their fire in its arch and feeding it into a defensive arch.

The band isn’t large, but they’re slowed down with their injuries. He stations sentries in every major direction before going to visit the neighboring territories that are allied with them and offer them escorted passage.

Mihkaira’s territory is under full martial siege, the Council’s forces raiding their borders every night. When Allison rides in with a fire slinging Erica and Scott who has essentially enchanted the forest around the territory to eat enemies, Mikhaira can only smile, wipe her face and grin.

She’s wearing her trainee cloak and happy to see them, “Hi!”

Cathlyn officially signs the alliance with Beacon Hills and shakes hands with Derek as soon as both seals are pressed onto the page, the barrier extends to across the territory. Mikhaira gawks at Derek.

“Since when could you do that?”

Derek grinned, “Since Stiles became our emissary.”

She squealed in delight, because obviously it was called for, they share sentinel patterns and talk about refugees over a hurried lunch before Erica and Derek headed back to Beacon Hills central. Allison was an obvious choice and as everyone loved a pixie, Scott was the best option for some soothing back-up.

Stiles is summoning hellhound sentinels to do reconnaissance on the lands beyond the barrier as he flies above them when he sees her. She’s bleeding, her cloak billowing out behind her, shielding her from the blasts of magic that explode the ground around her and running with the kind of determination that means trouble. He signals the hounds to deal with her persurers before landing where she can see. Ayr slides from the last shockwave and rolls to a stop not too far away from him.

She looks up, eyes half closed and bleary… she looks like hell.

“Please,” she said softly. “Help… Orcs…”

Stiles kneeled to get her attention and weave healing spells over her, “Ayr, you still with me?”

She groaned and nodded, “What happened?”

She swallowed. Her clan leader had wanted to join a Council territory. They’d promise land and support. When they’d arrived at negotiations, they’d demanded access to Ayr, to turn her over to the Council for questioning, when her clan leader refused… they’d killed him and raided their territory.

“Where is everyone else?” He asked.

“Hiding in the mountains, but it’s not safe and we aren’t prepared for the change in weather… We can’t stay there long. Please… I beg you.”

He settled his hands on her shoulders and told her to breath, “We’ll get them to safety. Just breathe for me.”

He taps on his headset to let Derek know that he’s going to get Ayr and to keep a look out for any of the other emissary kids that may come seeking refuge. Derek tells him that they’ve gotten several other territories to agree to stand with Beacon Hills, but the barrier won’t extend.

Stiles knows that means that there’s something in their promise to stand that isn’t conducive to the Beacon Hills way, nor well liked by the barrier. They weren’t under treaty, but a simple offering of support verbally that was neither set in stone nor useful… that or they were wandering bands that had no territory to be anchored to.

Once Ayr had caught her breath, Stiles took her hand and called for help. She shrieked and grabbed for her missing knives as a black dragon floated down and landed. Kind yellow-green eyes looked at him and then to Ayr who looked about ready to run.

“Gwaine!” He greeted, giving the dragon a hug. “It’s nice to see you. This is Ayr. Ayr this is Gwaine, honestly don’t be so frightened, climb on.”

She looked at him as if he were insane, so he put her on the dragon’s back and climbed on in front of her before telling Gwaine about where they were going.

“You’ve tamed a dragon…” Ayr said.

“A very fast dragon,” he said, “Hold on tight.”

She did so and screamed as they shot through the air as if through a portal and were suddenly sailing over the Sierra Nevada. They landed near enough to the climb they would have to make. Stiles asked Gwaine to keep an eye out for danger before following Ayr up the climb. She isn’t surprised, or at least she shouldn’t be surprised, that he can climb so well.

“What sort of wiccan are you?” Ayr asked, “You tame dragons and climb mountains…”

“I also make a really mean peach cobbler,” he said with a grin as they reached the ledge leading into the cave.

*

Derek isn’t sure how he’s keeping the red out of his eyes, maybe it’s because he has to keep Anai calm, who is curled up against him. Victor is pacing the hallway, thrumming with energy and Cora is gone to get something.

“Why did they hurt Rosa’?”

Derek rumbled at her and stroked her hair, “I don’t know, sweet, but they’re going to do everything they can to make sure Rosa’s alright.”

Anai nodded, clinging to him, snuggling into his arms as Melissa appeared with a deep sigh.

“She pulled through,” Melissa said. “We got enough of the wolfsbane out of her system for her healing to kick in. She’s in a lot of pain, but she wants to see you.”

Derek nodded, standing with Anai in his arms and following Melissa towards ICU where Rosalina was. Victor and Cora follow behind, half curious and half worried. A lycan that Derek had grown attached to in their absence was something, a lycan omega, knowing that Derek had once been an omega, pulled at a very different set of heart strings.

She looks like hell, mostly gauze and bruises. The smell of wolfbane and antidote are thick in the air, but not nearly as thick as when Derek brought her in. The eye that isn’t covered is open and looking at him.

“Hey,” he said, sitting on the edge of the bed and taking her hand, “Doctors say you’re going to be just fine.”

“I’m…sorry,” she croaked. “I… didn’t know where else to go…”

He hushed her, “Don’t apologize. This mafia takes care of our own. Rest and we’ll talk more when you’re stronger, okay?”

There’s a sound of agreement, tears that probably burn her already painful wounds, and a whimper. Anai pats her hand, careful not to hurt her more than she already is and they stay there in the hospital room with her for the rest of the night. When Derek gets a call, Victor takes the sleeping child from his arms and snuggles her up to him beneath his blanket.

“Go on,” he said. “I’ll keep an eye on things here.”

He nodded and left to take the call. Refugees from all across the world are rushing here bringing reports of the amassing army marching to take out Beacon Hills and hold a major siege while destroying or annexing every territory in its wake. Most the nineteen have returned in some form or another. Derek passed Ayr and her mother, huddled together in a triage room on his way out.

Alexandros and his baby brother, a tiny three year old by the name of Koios, are there too. Marq and his aunt, Vlad and his sister, a non-shifter from an all shifter family… According to Stiles, the others have refused to associate with Beacon Hills. The Pendragon girl he isn’t surprised with but Aurora is rather surprising considering how much she wanted to be a part of the Pack.

It’s quiet for a few days before Aurora strolls into the territory from the main portal and walks into City Hall. The Pack is having a meeting about the next phase of action. Erica is leading the discussion as she’s the one most recently back from front lines. With the Council going into martial order, most higher level schools have been put on hold with the exception of Beacon Hills’s almost non-existent emissarial program. Those that want to do so transfer into the school, everyone else merely joins the pack. Rosalina is out of the hospital, still mostly bandage and tender, but she wants to be kept informed of what’s going on as she fully intends to be a part of the mafia.

“They’re going to come from the East and maybe by sea which means—“

The door opened and the entire room turned to look at Aurora, carrying a scroll, wearing a pin that says BH on a earth brown cloak. It’s a standard issue cloak from the Council and Stiles already knows that it’s going to turn out badly.

Derek looked at her as she walked into the room as she turned to address the Pack and Stiles.

“I’m here on behalf of the Council,” she started.

Erica scoffed, “Really?’

Aurora cleared her throat, “As Emissary, it’s my duty to look out for the interests of the territory. I’ve asked the Council to let me speak to you before they attack Beacon Hills. In the hopes, that you’re listen to reason.”

Erica laughed outright then, “You can’t be serious!”

Derek, being ever diplomatic, offers her the seat across from Stiles.

“We’ll continue this later,” Derek said to the Pack. “Go get lunch.”

Erica is cackling as they leave. Stiles fixes her with a polite smile as Derek moves to leave with them.

“Where are you going?”

“Council information is passed through my emissary first,” Derek said, kissing Stiles’s cheek. “I’ll be back with lunch.”

Her jaw dropped as the door closes behind him and Stiles regards her. Her face is flushed with barely veiled anger.

“Sleeping with the Alpha doesn’t make you a good emissary,” she said. “I’ve negotiated with the Council to save Beacon Hills while you’re fooling around. You’re a  _ joke _ .”

Stiles let her talk, watching her face get angrier and angrier, her words get meaner and louder until she’s nearly screaming, that empty sort of screaming that means she can’t understand what she did wrong and she won’t ever understand because she won’t open her eyes.

“Well?! Are you going to say anything?!”

“Are you here to yell at me or are you here to present the Council’s terms of surrender?”

She gawked, “What?”

“Are you here to throw a temper tantrum or to negotiate?”

Her lips twitch as she shoves the scroll forward, “This is what the Council is demanding in order to call off the attack.”

Stiles picks up a pen, opens the scroll and begins to read. It sounds like thinly veiled threats, covered in lies, and rolled in a very large bluff. It’s a declaration of war if they don’t give in and a promise of servitude if they do.

“Tell me,” Stiles started. “What are your feelings on their proposition?”

“I believe that given the potential for casualties their requests are fair.”

“Taking down the barrier?”

“As a sign of trust and goodwill,” she said. “Beacon Hills has been making great strides to becoming a first-class territory, part of that is transparency and accessibility for the Council. I don’t see how it’s an unfair request.”

“Derek leaving his position?”

“They want someone with a little more experience.”

“Control over Beacon Hills’ economy and trade?”

“All Council territories pay taxes and have that provision.”

“Institution of martial order and segregation for the next sixty years.”

“As a sign of trust and goodwill, it’s to quell any tension.”

Stiles sets the scroll aside, “Tell me Aurora, you’re from a Council territory aren’t you?”

“Yes.”

“A first-class?”

“Yes.”

“And it’s all druid-isn’t it?”

“Yes.”

Stiles nodded, “Do you like it?”

“Yes, the people are very happy.”

“So why did you come to Beacon Hills?” Stiles asked. “If you were so happy?”

“To help,” she said. “My uncle said that Beacon Hills was a wayward territory in need of some guidance and my Dad was an emissary before he became a part of the Council and suggested that I go.”

“What do you think of Beacon Hills?”

She frowned, “It’s a very odd place with no guidance, no order, and it’s rather unruly.”

Stiles nodded, “And?”

“I think it could use guidance, but it could be a great Council territory.”

Stiles nodded, “And what would that guidance look like?”

A stronger infrastructure, a better relationship with the council, a closed border policy, there were a myriad of things, very druid things that she mentioned and if Beacon Hills was a Druid territory, it would make sense. If it was a singular species territory than what she was saying would make sense, but it’s not.

“Let me explain to you where you went wrong,” Stiles said kindly. “Originally through no fault of your own, but as you have refused to take the many chances for redemption that you’ve been offered, this now falls squarely on your shoulders. When I’m done, you can feel free to storm out, tell the Council everything I’ve said because you need to hear it. Not just for right now, but for your life if you really want to be an emissary.”

Her eyes narrowed at him.

“First, you assumed that your experience in a solely druid council territory would be translatable to another territory. You assumed that just the position needed to be filled rather than the work of an emissary needed to be done and you assumed the work to be done would be mainly peripheral. You came to a territory which was on the tail-end of several major upheavals with no intention on learning the territory, the history, nor the culture of the territory. Worse than that, you intended to change it no matter who you pissed off.”

“The work of an emissary is not to control the territories we represent, but to lead and sometimes follow the people we represent. It’s to safeguard every person in the territory against themselves and set rules in place that foster good relations throughout the territory.”

“You lied to the Pack, you put them in danger, and now you’re telling them to give up their home and livelihood, telling the territory to give up their home and livelihood, to an organization who hasn’t lent a stitch of aid since the beginning of Beacon Hills.”

“Beacon Hills was never a council approved territory,” she said, she knew that much. How could they justify lending their resources to someone outside?”

“You’re right,” he said. “We never have been and we never will be because we won’t play by their rules. They not only didn’t help, but attempted to sabotage Beacon Hills at every turn: assassination attempts, ordering poaching brigades to descend on the territory, never-ending sieges, releasing dark spirits into the territory…. I could go on.”

She shut her mouth then. Good, at least she wasn’t completely blind, just fearful, naive… Goddess, everything he’d been in high school, training his mind to pass the emissary test, everything he’d been until Claudia died, until they gave him that letter and took everything he’d been using to define himself away from him--everything until he couldn’t be that any longer.

“Being an emissary means putting the needs of your territory first—above your own, above the Council’s whims. It’s to stand your ground for the people you’re protecting.”

“The Council will destroy everything. What is sixty years of martial order to the complete annihilation of all these people?”

Stiles snorted, “The Council couldn’t obliterate us in the two hundred plus years we didn’t have a barrier…it’s a bluff, a ploy, a promise they can’t follow through on—the same lie they’ve been telling for years. Claudia and Talia proved them wrong, and Derek and I have as well.”

“You can’t know that. Can’t you see that it’s more logical to just give in! What about the protection? Aren’t you tired of fighting?”

Stiles shook his head, “You’ll never understand Aurora because someone else, your family, your territory, has always just bowed down and been given just enough to trick themselves into thinking that they’re happy.”

“We are happy!”

Stiles nodded, “Right… when they cut down every Nemeton in your territory, were you happy?”

“It was…a long time ago…”

“When hundred of druids went missing, poached straight out of the city and no one came to help, were they happy?”

“I… They led an investigation.”

“They  _ profit _ from people going missing,” Stiles said with a shake his head. “The Council doesn’t give a damn about anyone in their territories. They care about power and money. That’s all. Can’t you see that Beacon Hills is just that: a beacon, a promise that they can be fought.”

“You’re just saying that because you’ve never been in a Council territory!”

Stiles smiled, “Let me tell you why I’m not allowed to take the emissary exam.”

Her eyes widen and her jaw dropped as he explained what happened to him. The Nogitsune, the letter, the recovery, the amount of time he’d spent in Council territories watching them kill people for being different, for not following their ways of doing things.

“You’re lying… they wouldn’t…”

“Your Uncle,” he said. “And all of the rest of the Council signed those letters, unleashed that spirit to shake Beacon Hills, to take it over in the panic and they failed and this war, this decree, these demands are just them grabbing at straws because they know that in a real fight, even with all of their intrigue, we’ll win—every damn time.”

“It’s not true,” she said shaking her head. “You’re lying.”

“Why don’t you ask them?”

“You’re lying!” She said with a desperation that made his heart quake. Her eyes were hopeless though, something in her knew and recognized that Stiles had no reason to lie to her and that her entire life had been a tiny part in a much larger scheme.

“There is always a place for you here Aurora,” Stiles said. “But I don’t think you’re ready for it. I don’t think you’re ready to be truly free.”

She stands up and leaves without another word, rushing down the steps and out the front doors. Her legs take her straight to the main portal and out of it to her home territory. She looked up to city hall where her uncle and father would be with Stiles’s words ringing in her ears.

*

Derek found Stiles still sitting there at the table, his hands gripped tightly and taking deep breaths. Tears streaming down his face and sets the bags of food, the best burritos in Beacon Hills on the table before pulling Stiles into his lap and cuddling him close.

“It isn’t your fault,” Derek said. “You’ve done everything you can.”

Stiles doesn’t say anything, but his heart hurts, his stomach twists. She’s going to get herself killed and maybe, just maybe, in the last moments of her life she would understand the kind of people she’d defended, the people that had made her warden to her own prison.

“It… isn’t… fair,” Stiles bit out.

Derek kissed his forehead, “No… it isn’t.”

*

It’s a full three weeks before words comes in about the army that has surrounded Beacon Hills. There are poachers in reserve as they’re sure that the barrier, while strong, won’t be enough to protect all the territories outside of its influence. Aurora finds herself at the front with the main Council members as Derek and Stiles walk out to meet them along with the members of the Pack and the other heads of territories in alliance with Beacon Hills on paper. Stiles sees through the ranks and beyond to the back of the line and the focuses on the faces of the Councilmen.

“Derek—”

“Alpha Hale to you,” he growled. “How’s your stomach?”

The council member sneered at him as another stepped forward.

“I hear that you’ve declined our offer from my niece, it’s a shame that you had to be as obstinate as your mothers were… you’ll end up just like them soon enough.”

The end of Stiles’s staff is at his throat so fast, he doesn’t have time to scream at the glowing coming from the man’s eyes beneath his blood red cloak, looking so very much like Claudia it’s a bit like looking at a ghost.

“Don’t make me accidentally your head off.”

“You think you all are going to be enough to defeat the army. Even if you hide behind your barrier, you’ll never go anywhere. There will be no end to the siege.”

“No, but if we kill you all right now we won’t have to worry about it now will we?”

Erica gives a small grin, eyes glinting at the first one to show an ounce a fear.

“I won’t be threatened by a boy who sold his soul to a demon.”

Derek growled, eyes red and Aurora moves in front of him before he can drag his claws through the man only to freeze. Derek’s eyes widened and hers widen in shock. They look down to the growing red blot in her chest and Derek manages to catch her as she falls. The man watches her fall against Derek and pulls the knife free from her.

“What a waste,” he said. “But I suppose she’d served her purpose.”

Aurora choked, blood rushing up out of her mouth, “Daddy…?”

*

There’s the steady beep of an EKG and the smell of herbs in the air. There’s pain and a heaviness to her body that tells her that she’s been out for a while. At her bedside, there’s Stiles, his legs propped up on the windowsill, laptop in his lap and typing furiously.

He isn’t aware that she’s looking at him as her eyes drift around the room. There is no one else around when she remembers that the pain is from the knife that her father had shoved into her back when she’s thrown herself in front of him to protect him from Derek’s claws. She remembers the Derek’s eyes were blood red, his claws raised, but he’d stopped…

After everything… he’d stopped. A man who she’d more or less betrayed, deceived and owed her no loyalty, had stopped.

_ Served her purpose… _ the words burn hot and bright in her eyes and pour down her cheeks until her body is shaking with it, broken sobbing in her chest. She doesn’t deserve the way Stiles sets everything aside to pull her into his arms and stroke her hair. She doesn’t deserve his kind words and promises that everything is okay, that it’s all over, that there is a place for her in Beacon Hills.

She doesn’t deserve it, but he gives it to her anyway…

“Why?” She croaked. “Why after how horrible I’ve been to you?”

Stiles grinned, “Maybe because I see a bit of who I used to be in you… maybe because that’s what being an emissary is about: mending and building bridges.”

She looked at him distraught, confused, but she understood. She understood what he’d been trying to tell her all this time as he told her about his time in high school.  Stiles had tried his best to be what someone else wanted, to cling to normalcy, to cling to the idea of being an emissary, to being what the Council wanted because that would get him acceptance and normalcy and maybe a little closer to saying  _ I’m me. _

“I’m… so… sorry…”

He smiled at her and pulled her close, “May we forgive our debt and settle our scores. Bury our hatchets here and come together to honor these words made real and ourselves reflected back to us in our dreams made real.”

She didn’t know what that meant, but they resonated somewhere inside where it hurt the most and she leaned against him with a low sniffle as the door opened and the Pack filed in. Scott brought a bouquet of flowers that were apparently still growing. They came in loud, grinning, the way they always did with Derek carrying Anai.

“Pretty gutsy,” Erica nodded. “You’ve got more spine than I thought.”

She swallowed not quite understanding what Erica was getting at as she took a seat.

“Your father’s an asshole,” Kira said. “As is your uncle, but you protected them and that took guts… took loyalty.”

“So long as you understand they have no loyalty to you and are prepared to go through a thorough re-education,” Erica said with a grin. “There might still be a spot in Beacon Hills for you.”

She sniffled and wiped her face, “Just… don’t hang me from any poles?”

“Only if you don’t whine,” Allison said.

They laughed. They held their pack meeting over her bed, explaining the outcome of the siege. Council: -9000; Beacon Hills: Over 3 million. Between Stiles’ ability to project a shield anywhere and generally being a Wiccan badass, or Paladin as Scott said with a giddy grin and Derek randomly stepping into and out of existence, the Pack had a pretty high kill count and sent them running with dragons following after them.

“Pretty epic,” Kira said with a grin. “Sorry you missed it.”

Aurora didn’t say anything, but took a deep breath as the nurse came in to check on her. Lenara came by as did the rest of the emissaries in training that had returned to help to greet her. She apologized to Lenara and only earned a grin.

“We don’t hold grudges dear,” she said. “This is where all hatchets are buried.”

She got a cheek pinched for her efforts and candy in her lap. She had nowhere to go, no one to call, no one she could call family anymore if her own father had stabbed her and been prepared to let her bleed to death… but this… this weird ragtag family, this mafia that left no one behind…

She nodded, this she could call home.


	21. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 5 Years Later...

The keys jingle in the door as Stiles walks into the house. It’s empty since it’s midday, but he knows that there’s food there for him. Derek promised. He waved his cloak to hang itself in his and Derek’s closet, walks out of his boots and headed to kitchen for food. He’d been in negotiations with a band of wendigos for the last three days on behalf of a nearby territory, there hadn’t been any time to eat when negotiations began to go south.

The glint of his ring catches his eye and he smiled, closing his eyes and breathing to reach for Derek across the territory. He’s at the orphanage running around with the children with Anai now about six years old able to run with them and eager to follow her Alpha around the courtyard with the other kids. For what he can see, she’s wearing a mini-replica of his trademark clothing: a red shirt, blue jeans, and bangles around her wrists. The back of her shirt says “My Dad Tames Dragons.” Lenara had bought it for her with the express purpose of evening out her closet so she could emulate all members of the Pack.

_ I’m home, _ he brushes against Derek’s mind. He sees him stop and look in the direction of the Hale House, his eyes glowing red and grinning.

“Welcome back,” he said to the wind. “Be home soon. Pack Night.”

Stiles grinned, shoving a sandwich in his mouth before starting to make dinner. Victor appeared with a grin to hug him and popped back out of existence with a laugh. He always did it since it drove Derek crazy to have someone else touch him that smelled so much like himself before he could since he didn’t have full control of his powers quite yet. He was working on it.

Stiles has enough time to get a real nap in before Anai comes bounding up the stairs with Derek to jump on him in bed and greet him in an extraordinarily lycan way. Mostly nuzzling and scenting that makes him laugh and hug them both.

“I got it! I got it!”

Anai snuffled and curled up in his arms, rumbling low and closing her eyes, “Welcome home, Dad.”

He kissed her temple, “Thanks munchkin. You too, stud.”

Derek snorted and kissed him, “Welcome back, Twinkie. How’d negotiations go?”

“Everyone made it out in one piece and there is an agreement so… progress I guess.”

Derek nodded and let Stiles climb out of bed with Anai still in his arms. She was still rather small for her age, but that could mean anything considering that she hadn’t manifested her lycan side. Scott was the first to steal her away, hug Stiles and rush to the den where games were being laid out. They’d amassed a ridiculous number of board games over the years: Monopoly (which was practically banned thanks to Allison), Boggle, Chutes and Ladders, Sorry (which was very banned if Jackson was going to play), Jumanji (which was only played when Stiles was around to keep a magic neutralizing spell going during game play. Scott had managed to bring home the copy that had been enchanted.), and of course Candyland and all the other favorites of their childhood. The Hales had been big on family game night and it was a tradition that they had just reenacted when the core pack had moved in to the Hale House. Rosalina had officially been adopted into the Hale family and disowned by the Ochoas, which meant Derek had an even greater reason to claw their faces off the next time they saw each other with no remorse.

“Any news?” Stiles asked the group.

“There’s a war in Amsterdam, Germany’s trying to succeed from it,” Erica said with a grin. “Something about the Reyes family oppressing the human population there…”

Boyd chuckled, “We all know how heart-broken you are about that.”

She shrugged, “Serves them right.”

Stiles nodded, in all fairness it had been their fault. Ever since the territory had annexed what used to be Germany, there had been nothing but trouble for everyone. Vampyr in power usually had a way of making the human population unhappy and there just wasn’t enough variety in Germany to stabilize it. He had no doubt that they’d be hearing about someone mixing silver in Lord Reyes’ drinks soon.

“So ends another great dynasty…anyone else?”

“Delphi has officially banned their “Oracle Enlisting” rule,” Boyd said with a grin. “After much persuasion.”

Stiles nodded, “I trust it wasn’t too bloody.”

He shrugged, “It was… less bloody than Erica in Wallachia.”

Erica grinned, toothy and malicious. Wallachia had been a different kind of fun all together.

“Rosa’? How’d it go with Washington?”

Rosalina tilted her head, “Only the minimal amount of claw required.”

God, she was being corrupted, but what could anyone expect. Rosalina had become the official lycan representative of the Pack and had quickly unlearned all of the lycan rules and taken up the Hale motto of “claw them when they don’t have sense and reprimand them later.”

There had been a pack of lycans causing trouble on the newly annexed border. While the barrier had expanded as soon as the paperwork with Mikhaira’s original territory was signed, there was still trouble to deal with the space in between them and the Lycan Pack in Washington who swore up and down that they owned a part of the territory that was now behind the barrier.

They were really just angry because they couldn’t steal cows anymore. Rosalina and Mikhaira went armed to the teeth to show them that there was nothing to negotiate and if they kept harassing people they’d get a face full of steel and a neck full of teeth.

“Mihk’ getting better with her hand to hand combat.”

The girl in question blushed as Stiles grinned, “I’m sure your hands on training has been helping a lot.”

Rosalina glowered at him as Derek laughed, because obviously they though they were hiding their slowly budding romance and weird threesome with Alexander. Another knock sounded at the door before it opened and children came running in to tackle Derek, growling with mischief.

“Cousin Derek! Show us your fangs, Cousin Derek!”

“Can you teleport me to the candy shop?”

“Are you really a black wolf?”

He laughed peeling the little bundles of energy off of him to answer their questions and send them off to play with Anai in the backyard. Aunts and Uncles came to hug him, greet him and Stiles before settling down in the living room among all the cards.

If at some time during the night, Stiles steps away to walk outside and look at the Beacon shining in the distance, and Derek follows after him, no one says anything.

“Hey.”

Stiles turned his head as Derek came to lean on the banister of the porch beside him.

“You okay, Twinkie?”

He nodded slowly, looking back into the distance, “Just… getting used to her really being gone.”

Derek nodded and took Stiles’s hand. He’d laid his mother to rest finally, releasing her from the wind to move on not even a few months ago when he realized that he actually could. He’d smelled like sorrow and cried on and off for weeks after. It wasn’t like a Talia and Laura whom he could commune with through the alpha spirit. It wasn’t even like Lydia hearing the voices of the dead. Communing with liberated Wiccan spirits was a trial of the damned as their magic ultimately dispersed into the universe and their soul went magic free to wherever it was that spirits watched from.

“I know how hard it is,” Derek said and pulled him closer to him. “She would be so proud of you.”

He nodded, it had been the very last thing she’d said to him before walking out of this world forever.

“Until we meet again,” Stiles said with a nod. “Come on, let’s get back in there before they think we’re making out on the porch again.”

Derek flushed, it had only happened one time and now the Pack thought it would happen  _ every time. _ As if they couldn’t control themselves…. Granted they couldn’t sometimes, but after years of living with the Pack in the Lofts and dealing with their ever active hormones, he deserved a fucking break for wanting to get his hands all over his husband multiple time a week.

He felt something, like a knock on the door inside his chest and turned to see Stiles summoning his cloak and getting ready to headout.

“Can’t we ever have a Pack Night where we actually get to play the games?” Scott wondered and Derek laughed.

“Stay. I’ll go, we should be back.”

“Just don’t make-out in the middle of the fight,” Erica said. “Or do.”

“Brats.”

He kissed Anai’s cheek and headed out after Stiles who was staring with those glowing cyan eyes, ancient runes glowing on his skin into the distance.

“What do you see?”

“Dragons flying over Maricopa. Pixie festival.”

“It never fucking ends does it?” Derek said rolling his shoulder as Stiles threw a circle of light forward and the portal emerged.

“Never. Highest Score gets tied up?”

Derek laughed, “Same rules as the last?”

He nodded, “Can’t wait to take you apart, Twinkie.”

“Sometimes I think you lose on purpose.”

Derek flashed a wolfy grin before vanishing and Stiles ran through the portal and encased his staff in magic before flying through the air and taking the first dragon down with his descent. They argue about the scoring later and Stiles  _ still _ ends up tied up even though Derek definitely killed more dragons than he did. Stiles doesn’t complain though.

When they lie together in bed, warm, sated, and exhausted, Derek grinned at him.

“Next time, loser gets tied up.”

Derek laughed as if that would change anything.


End file.
